Oligothiophene-Naphthalimide Hybrids Connected through Rigid and Conjugated Linkers in Organic Electronics: An Overview

Abstract

In this article, we summarize the synthetic approaches developed in our research groups during the last decade to efficiently tune the optical, electrochemical and morphological characteristics of oligothiophene–naphthalimide assemblies. Different variables were tuned in these organic semiconductors, such as the planarity and the length of their π-conjugated backbones, the topology and energy levels of the frontier molecular orbitals (HOMO and LUMO) and their molecular dipole moments. The tuning of these properties can be connected with the microstructure properties observed by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) in thin films as well as with the performances in organic field-effect transistors (OFETs). The possibility of incorporating these donor-acceptor assemblies into macromolecular structures is also addressed, and some innovative applications for these macromolecular systems, such as the degradation of organic pollutants in aqueous media, are also presented.