Welcome to our World
The Jeffries-EL group was started at the department of chemistry at Iowa State University in the fall of 2005.
The research emphasis of the group is the design and synthesis of conjugated polymers. From a chemical perspective, conjugated polymers are unique among all polymers because they posses a backbone with an extended (-conjugated systems. Their extended pi-system contains delocalized electrons, hence which gives rise to semiconductor like optical and electronic properties. As a result these electro-active polymers are finding use in a variety of applications including field-effect transistors, light-emitting materials, sensors and solar cells. The discovery of the conductive properties of conjugated polymers resulted in the awarding of the nobel prize in chemistry in 2000.
Some examples of typical conjugated polymers are shown above. From left to right: poly (para-phenylene) (PPP) and poly(para-phenylene vinylene) (PPV), poly (para-phenylene ethynylene) (PPE) and polythiophene (PT). Unsubstituted conjugated polymers are insoluble in most organic solvents, for this reason these polymers bear substitutents off of the polymer backbone to improve processing and solubility. The addition of substituents can also alter the electronic and physical properties of the polymer. Thus chemical synthesis can be used as a way to modify these properties via structural modification. This area of research offers an exciting opportunity to synthesize a variety of conjugated molecules that can be used to make new and interesting polymers.
