Photophysical analysis of dual fluorescence and phosphorescence emissions observed for semi-aliphatic polyimides at lower temperatures.

The photoluminescence (PL) properties of four types of blue fluorescent semi-aliphatic polyimides (PIs) derived from aromatic dianhydrides (ODPA, BPDA, HQDEA, and BPADA) and an alicyclic diamine (DCHM) were investigated at temperatures ranging from room temperature (RT, 298 K) to 30 K to analyse the origins of their non-radiative relaxation (NR) processes. These PIs exhibited significant increases in fluorescence (FL) intensity and lifetimes when lowering the temperature, stabilising below 100 K. The PIs containing ether (-O-) linkages showed a shoulder peak at around 500 nm below 150 K, which is attributable to phosphorescence (PH). These results show that the NR deactivation at RT includes three processes: intersystem crossing (ISC) from the excited singlet (S ₁ ) to the triplet (T ₁ ) state, temperature-dependent NR from the S ₁ state, which becomes suppressed below around 100 K, and temperature-independent NR. Based on the analyses of the temperature dependences, polymer structures, and quantum chemical analysis of molecular orbitals, we contemplate that the temperature-dependent NR is attributable to the excitation quenching by defect states mediated by excitation migration, and the temperature-independent NR may be caused by the deactivation of the excited state induced by molecular vibrations.