Prominent processing techniques to manipulate semiconducting polymer microstructures

Abstract

Most of the technological applications that shape the development of our society and lifestyle are based on polymers. Whether we are talking about the automotive and aviation industry, packaging and adhesive materials, insulator and optoelectronic applications, medical devices and antibacterial/drug delivery solutions, environment and cosmetics, just to name a few, polymers have their valuable and well-established place. This is inclusively due to their low cost and straightforward processability. The latter is a key to the pathway towards future, novel polymer-based technologies due to its massive impact on the structure–property relationship. Therefore, it is critical to understand which strategies and processing techniques can be improved and further employed to efficiently alter the microstructure of specific polymers and thus, to control and enhance their final properties. In this work, we classify and analyze the most prominent processing techniques that have been recently developed and used in research and industrial laboratories to efficiently tune and manipulate, on nano-, micro- and macro-scales, the molecular arrangements and packing of, especially, conjugated polymers in films, solutions and solid state.