Fabrication of Photoluminescent Quantum Dot Thiol-yne Nanocomposites via Thermal Curing or Photopolymerization

Strong, flexible, and transparent materials have garnered tremendous interest in recent years as materials and electronics manufacturers pursue devices that are bright, flexible, durable, tailorable, and lightweight. Depending on the starting components, polymers fabricated using thiol–yne chemistry have been shown to be exceptionally strong and/or flexible, while also being amenable to modification by the incorporation of nanoparticles. In the present work, novel ligands were synthesized and used to functionalize quantum dots (QDs) of various diameters. The functionalized QDs were then incorporated into thiol–yne prepolymer matrices. These matrices were subsequently polymerized to form QD thiol–yne nanocomposite polymers. To demonstrate the versatility of the fabrication process, the prepolymers were either thermally cured or photopolymerized. The resulting transparent nanocomposites expressed the size-specific color of the QDs within them when exposed to ultraviolet irradiation, demonstrating that QDs can be incorporated into thiol–yne polymers without significantly altering QD expression. With the inclusion of QDs, thiol–yne nanocomposite polymers are promising candidates for use in numerous applications including as device display materials, optical lens materials, and/or sensor materials.