Mapping Polymer Molecular Order in the SEM with Secondary Electron Hyperspectral Imaging

Understanding nanoscale molecular order within organic electronic materials is a crucial factor in building better organic electronic devices. At present, techniques capable of imaging molecular order within a polymer are limited in resolution, accuracy, and accessibility. In this work, presented ar...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Advanced science 2019-03, Vol.6 (5), p.1801752-n/a
Main Authors: Masters, Robert C., Stehling, Nicola, Abrams, Kerry J., Kumar, Vikas, Azzolini, Martina, Pugno, Nicola M., Dapor, Maurizio, Huber, Andreas, Schäfer, Philip, Lidzey, David G., Rodenburg, Cornelia
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
electron microscope
Energy
Mapping
Microscopy
molecular order
organic electronics
polymer
Polymers
secondary electron spectroscopy
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Summary:Understanding nanoscale molecular order within organic electronic materials is a crucial factor in building better organic electronic devices. At present, techniques capable of imaging molecular order within a polymer are limited in resolution, accuracy, and accessibility. In this work, presented are secondary electron (SE) spectroscopy and secondary electron hyperspectral imaging, which make an exciting alternative approach to probing molecular ordering in poly(3‐hexylthiophene) (P3HT) with scanning electron microscope‐enabled resolution. It is demonstrated that the crystalline content of a P3HT film is reflected by its SE energy spectrum, both empirically and through correlation with nano‐Fourier‐transform infrared spectroscopy, an innovative technique for exploring nanoscale chemistry. The origin of SE spectral features is investigated using both experimental and modeling approaches, and it is found that the different electronic properties of amorphous and crystalline P3HT result in SE emission with different energy distributions. This effect is exploited by acquiring hyperspectral SE images of different P3HT films to explore localized molecular orientation. Machine learning techniques are used to accurately identify and map the crystalline content of the film, demonstrating the power of an exciting characterization technique. Understanding nanoscale molecular order within organic electronic materials is a crucial factor in building better organic electronic devices. Here, secondary electron hyperspectral imaging (SEHI), a technique in the scanning electron microscope, is combined with machine‐learning techniques to map molecular order in a semiconducting polymer with
ISSN:2198-3844
2198-3844
DOI:10.1002/advs.201801752