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Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction of a photoaligned nematic semiconductor

Dröge, Stefan; Khalifah, Manea S Al; O'Neill, Mary; Thomas, Huw E.; Simmonds, Henje S.; Macdonald, J. Emyr; Aldred, Matthew P.; Vlachos, Panos; Kitney, Stuart P.; Löbbert, Andreas; Kelly, Stephen M.

Authors

Stefan Dröge

Manea S Al Khalifah

Mary O'Neill

Huw E. Thomas

Henje S. Simmonds

J. Emyr Macdonald

Matthew P. Aldred

Panos Vlachos

Stuart P. Kitney

Andreas Löbbert

Stephen M. Kelly



Abstract

Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction is used to find the thin film morphology of an extended molecule with an irregular alternating fluorene - thiophene structure, which is used to obtain linearly polarized electroluminescence and the photovoltaic effect. The material has a room temperature nematic glassy phase and is uniaxially aligned in the plane of the film using photoalignment techniques. Two distinct intermolecular separations of 0.45 and 1.5 nm are identified showing that the molecules are lamellar. The lamellae stack with only local order and the two short axes of the lamellae have no preferred orientation at the surface or bulk of the film. Neighboring molecules show a wide range of longitudinal displacements along the axis of the director, as expected for a nematic liquid crystal with no positional order. There is, however, a dominant feature corresponding to a longitudinal offset of 0.51 nm. Unlike some other fluorene-containing semiconductors where microphase separation of the side chains inhibits close packing of neighboring molecules, the lamellar structure and 0.45 intermolecular spacing found here allows π-π intermolecular interactions for efficient carrier transport. We obtain a room temperature hole mobility up to 3.4 × 10 -3 cm 2 V -1 s -1 using a time-of-flight technique. © 2009 American Chemical Society.

Citation

Dröge, S., Khalifah, M. S. A., O'Neill, M., Thomas, H. E., Simmonds, H. S., Macdonald, J. E., Aldred, M. P., Vlachos, P., Kitney, S. P., Löbbert, A., & Kelly, S. M. (2009). Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction of a photoaligned nematic semiconductor. Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 113(1), 49-53. https://doi.org/10.1021/jp803379a

Journal Article Type Article
Publication Date Jan 8, 2009
Deposit Date Nov 13, 2014
Journal Journal Of Physical Chemistry B
Print ISSN 1520-6106
Publisher American Chemical Society
Peer Reviewed Peer Reviewed
Volume 113
Issue 1
Pages 49-53
DOI https://doi.org/10.1021/jp803379a
Keywords Grazing incidence X-ray diffraction, organic semiconductor, photoalignment, nematic liquid crystal,
Public URL https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/461310
Publisher URL https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jp803379a
Contract Date Nov 13, 2014