DEVLOPING STRUCTURE-PROPERTY RELATIONSHIPS IN RADICAL POLYMERS THROUGH ADVANCED MACROMOELCULAR DESIGN

Recently, there has been significant increase in research and development in the field of organic electronics. This is mainly because organic electronic devices can be flexible, lightweight, and processed from solution using low-cost manufacturing techniques. Typically, these devices have utilized conjugated polymers as their active layer components. This approach has been successful, but the use of conjugated polymers comes with limitations. To address these limitations and expand the field of organic electronics, this work studies a novel class of macromolecules, radical polymers. Unlike their conjugated polymer counterparts, radical polymers are comprised of a non-conjugated backbone with stable open-shell groups at their pendant sites. By studying the structure-property relationships of these radical polymers, this work developed novel polymer systems for a variety of organic electronic applications. Furthermore, these studies can be applied to future radical polymer systems yet to be discovered. Ultimately, this work served as a template for expanding the field of organic electronics.