2017 Theses Doctoral

Block copolymer templates for functional nanostructured materials: Periodic patterning and hierarchical ordering

Tran, Helen

Simple molecular building blocks, arranged in a repeating manner with hierarchical levels of organization, may lead to emergent functional properties, which would not otherwise be exhibited by the building blocks alone. The design principles of periodicity and hierarchical order are pervasive in nature, and have been borrowed to engineer man-made materials with functionality beyond their component parts. This thesis explores the development and application of block copolymers as templates for the fabrication of functional nanostructures. The core linear diblock copolymer may be pre- or post-functionalized with elements such as semiconducting moieties, topochemical precursors, and biomolecules. Periodicity is observed in the highly-ordered packing of the small molecules and patterns resulting from the cooperative self-assembly of the block copolymers and small molecules. The collective order of periodic structures at multiple lengths scales, ranging from the nanometer to micrometer regime, leads to the fabrication of hierarchical systems. These findings contribute to the critical development of complex architectures and understanding their structure-property relationships.