skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.


Title: Exciton Bimolecular Annihilation Dynamics in Push–Pull Semiconductor Polymers
Exciton−exciton annihilation is a ubiquitous nonlinear dynamic phenomenon in materials hosting Frenkel excitons. In this work, we investigate the nonlinear exciton dynamics of an electron push−pull conjugated polymer by fluence-dependent transient absorption and excitation-correlation photoluminescence spectroscopy, where we can quantitatively show the latter to be a more selective probe of the nonlinear dynamics. Simulations based on a time-independent exciton annihilation model show a decreasing trend for the extracted annihilation rates with excitation0 fluence. Further investigation of the fluence-dependent transients suggests that the exciton−exciton annihilation bimolecular rates are not constant in time, displaying a t−1/2 time dependence, which we rationalize as reflective of one-dimensional exciton diffusion, with a length estimated to be 9 ± 2 nm. In addition, exciton annihilation gives rise to a long-lived species that recombines on a nanosecond time scale. Our conclusions shed broad light onto nonlinear exciton dynamics in push−pull conjugated polymers.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1922111
PAR ID:
10531360
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
American Chemical Society
Date Published:
Journal Name:
The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters
Edition / Version:
1
Volume:
15
Issue:
1
ISSN:
1948-7185
Page Range / eLocation ID:
272 to 280
Subject(s) / Keyword(s):
exciton-exciton annihilation push-pull polymers DPP-DTT photophysical spectroscopy
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. π-Helical push–pull dyes were prepared and their (chir)optical properties were investigated both experimentally and computationally. Specific fluorescent behaviour of bis-substituted system was observed with unprecedented solvent effect on the intensity of circularly polarized luminescence (CPL, dissymmetry factor decreasing from 10 −2 to 10 −3 with an increase in solvent polarity) that was linked to a change in symmetry of chiral excited state and suppression of interbranched exciton coupling. The results highlight the potential of CPL spectroscopy to study and provide a deeper understanding of electronic photophysical processes in chiral π-conjugated molecules. 
    more » « less
  2. A major limitation of transient optical spectroscopy is that relatively high laser fluences are required to enable broadband, multichannel detection with acceptable signal-to-noise levels. Under typical experimental conditions, many condensed phase and nanoscale materials exhibit fluence-dependent dynamics, including higher order effects such as carrier–carrier annihilation. With the proliferation of commercial laser systems, offering both high repetition rates and high pulse energies, have come new opportunities for high sensitivity pump-probe measurements at low pump fluences. However, experimental considerations needed to fully leverage the statistical advantage of these laser systems have not been fully described. Here, we demonstrate a high repetition rate, broadband transient spectrometer capable of multichannel shot-to-shot detection at 90 kHz. Importantly, we find that several high-speed cameras exhibit a time-domain fixed pattern noise resulting from interleaved analog-to-digital converters, which is particularly detrimental to the conventional “ON/OFF” modulation scheme used in pump-probe spectroscopy. Using a modified modulation and data processing scheme, we achieve a noise level of 10−5 in 4 s for differential transmission, an order of magnitude lower than for commercial 1 kHz transient spectrometers for the same acquisition time. We leverage the high sensitivity of this system to measure the differential transmission of monolayer graphene at low pump fluence. We show that signals on the order of 10−6 OD can be measured, enabling a new data acquisition regime for low-dimensional materials. 
    more » « less
  3. Bound and unbound Frenkel-exciton pairs are essential transient precursors for a variety of photophysical and biochemical processes. In this work, we identify bound and unbound Frenkel-exciton complexes in an electron push−pull polymer semiconductor using coherent two- dimensional spectroscopy. We find that the dominant A0−1 peak of the absorption vibronic progression is accompanied by a subpeak, each dressed by distinct vibrational modes. By considering the Liouville pathways within a two-exciton model, the imbalanced cross-peaks in one-quantum rephasing and nonrephasing spectra can be accounted for by the presence of pure biexcitons. The two-quantum nonrephasing spectra provide direct evidence for unbound exciton pairs and biexcitons with dominantly attractive force. In addition, the spectral features of unbound exciton pairs show mixed absorptive and dispersive character, implying many-body interactions within the correlated Frenkel-exciton pairs. Our work offers novel perspectives on the Frenkel-exciton complexes in semiconductor polymers. 
    more » « less
  4. Linear and nonlinear optical lineshapes reveal details of excitonic structure in semiconductor polymers. We implement absorption, photoluminescence, and transient absorption spectroscopies in DPP-DTT, an electron push-pull copolymer, to explore the relationship between their spectral lineshapes and chain conformation, deduced from resonance Raman spectroscopy and from ab initio calculations. The viscosity of precursor polymer solutions before film casting displays a transition that suggests gel formation above a critical concentration. Upon crossing this viscosity deflection concentration, the lineshape analysis of the absorption spectra within a photophysical aggregate model reveals a gradual increase in interchain excitonic coupling. We also observe a red-shifted and line-narrowed steady-state photoluminescence spectrum, along with increasing resonance Raman intensity in the stretching and torsional modes of the dithienothiphene unit, which suggests a longer exciton coherence length along the polymer-chain backbone. Furthermore, we observe a change of lineshape in the photoinduced absorption component of the transient absorption spectrum. The derivative-like lineshape may originate from two possibilities: a new excited-state absorption, or from Stark effect, both of which are consistent with the emergence of high-energy shoulder as seen in both photoluminescence and absorption spectra. Therefore, we conclude that the exciton is more dispersed along the polymer chain backbone with increasing concentrations, leading to the hypothesis that the polymer chain order is enhanced when the push-pull polymers are processed at higher concentrations. Thus, tuning the microscopic chain conformation by concentration would be another factor of interest when considering the polymer assembly pathways for pursuing large-area and high-performance organic optoelectronic devices. 
    more » « less
  5. Abstract The ultrafast dynamics of photoexcited charge carriers are studied in micron‐scale crystals composed of the inorganic perovskite CsPbBr3with time‐resolved terahertz spectroscopy. Exciting with photon energy close to the band edge, it is found that a fast (<10 ps) decay emerges in the terahertz photoconductivity with increasing pump fluence and decreasing temperature, dominating the dynamics at 4 K. The fluence‐dependent dynamics can be globally fit by a nonlinear recombination model, which reveals that the influence of different nonlinear recombination mechanisms in the studied pump fluence range depends on temperature. Whereas the Auger scattering rate decreases with decreasing temperature from 77 to 4 K, the radiative recombination rate increases by three orders of magnitude. Spectroscopically, the terahertz photoconductivity resembles a Drude response at all delays, yet an additional Lorentz component due to an above‐bandwidth resonance is needed to fully reproduce the data. 
    more » « less