Literature Seminar
Photonic crystals are materials which possess a photonic band gap. When these band gaps are in the visible light regime structural color arises, precluding the need for toxic pigment or dyes to produce color. Structural color is widespread in nature with examples such as opal gemstones, butterfly wings, and responsive camouflage of chameleons. Approaches to produce synthetic mimics have yielded precise photonic band gap materials, but with the disadvantage of being expensive, unscalable for industrial or commodity applications. In stark contrast, the well-known self assembly of block copolymers allows for scalability and economical generation of photonic crystals. Coupled with the upsurge in 3-D printing technologies and significant synthetic advancements of block copolymer higher order architectures, polymers have become an attractive route to produce structural color. Here a new 3-D printing platform is leveraged to display the incredible tunability of block copolymers to selectively tune the photonic band gap and thus the structural color. The simple adjustment of printing parameters and underlying kinetic mechanism that yield these versatile organic photonic materials will be discussed.
Meeting ID: 758 1882 4637
Passcode: 1234
