This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Florida State University researchers have developed a method to make a class of materials more robust and potentially easier to manufacture for advanced radiation detection devices, including those used in medical imaging and radiation therapy as well as space technologies. Nearly a decade ago, FSU chemistry and biochemistry professor Biwu Ma and his lab pioneered research on low-dimensional organic metal halide hybrids, or OMHHs, and have since expanded the materials' structures, properties and applications across a range of technologies and industries.
Now, in collaboration with Robert O. Lawton Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Joseph Schlenoff and 3M Distinguished Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering Subramanian Ramakrishnan, the team has developed a novel technique to stabilize the materials and expand their potential for practical applications. Their joint findings were published in Advanced Functional Materials.
"Using a technique called crosslinking, we're shaping OMHHs before locking them into a more durable form," Ma said. "A familiar example is rubber in car tires. Crosslinking transforms rubber into a much more robust and durable material capable of withstanding demanding conditions.
Our chemistry is different, but the fundamental idea is similar: Connecting individual molecular components into a network can dramatically improve the physical robustness and stability of a material." OMHHs combine organic and inorganic components whose optical, electrical and magnetic properties can be tailored through molecular design. Researchers design these materials for technologies ranging from LEDs and solar cells to direct X-ray detectors and scintillators—materials that convert X-rays or other high-energy radiation into visible light. Despite their versatility, some OMHHs can be challenging to process into stable, durable structures because they can dissolve or degrade when exposed to water or common polar solvents.
In this study, Ma and his team developed zero-dimensional, or 0D, OMHHs in which individual metal-halide units are isolated from each other, and they incorporated reactive groups directly into the organic components of the 0D OMHH. After the material was solution-processed into a film, exposure to UV light connected these components into a covalent network that locked the isolated metal-halide units in place. This provided an important combination of processability before crosslinking and robustness afterward, while retaining the material's useful properties.
In testing, uncrosslinked films dissolved quickly in water and other solvents, while crosslinked films remained intact after prolonged exposure. "A material may perform well as a small laboratory sample, but real-world applications require reproducible manufacturing, long-term stability, integration with other components, and competitive cost and performance," Ma said. "Our research is increasingly focused not only on discovering materials with better properties, but also on how those materials can be processed, stabilized, manufactured and integrated into practical devices.
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