Photon Upconversion through Triplet-Triplet Annihilation: Towards Higher Efficiency and Solid State Applications
Doktorsavhandling, 2016
The sun is the only renewable energy source that can accommodate humanity’s energy
needs today and in the foreseeable future. The sunlight reaching the planet’s surface
is filtrated through the atmosphere, reducing its UV-light intensity in the 300-400 nm
range, which indeed can be harmful to life as we know it in too large doses. However,
many useful photoreactions require in practice such high-energy UV-photons, like the
catalytic splitting of water to oxygen and hydrogen gas or molecular in-bond energy
storage through isomerization to produce heat when reverting to the initial state. The
efficiency of these applications could be improved with efficient conversion of low-energy
visible to high-energy UV-light.
One way to achieve this type of photon upconversion (UC) is through the process called
Triplet-Triplet Annihilation (TTA) relying on the interaction between two molecules; a
sensitizer and an annihilator. The sensitizer absorbs low energy visible photons as input
and transfers that energy through Triplet Energy Transfer (TET) to an annihilator. Two
triplet-excited annihilators can thereafter perform TTA, merging the energy equivalents
of the two low-energy photons to produce one high-energy photon as output.
This Thesis is focused on improving the known bimolecular UC system in fluid
environment and approaching the ultimate goal of high efficiency UC in solid materials. In
the fluid system I demonstrate the employment of thiol- and thioether-based compounds
as scavengers for singlet excited oxygen with positive effect on UC efficiency and stability.
In an attempt to aid future design and optimization of upconversion system components
the anthracene is 9,10-substituted with electron withdrawing or donating groups while
its TTA-UC function is evaluated revealing that substitution at para-positions leads
to least perturbation of its spectroscopic properties. The ultimate goal is to achieve
supramolecular TTA-UC systems capable of efficient intra-molecular TET and TTA
processes and unhindered emission of the upconverted photons. As a first step, we focus
on the intra-molecular TTA process with oligomers and dendrimers of 9,10-diphenylanthracene (DPA) which display positive effects on UC efficiency in solid matrix. In
the second step the focus is on the intra-molecular TET process where the sensitizer-annihilator complexes are explored through Lewis base-acid coupling with orthogonal
transition moments for minimum excited state short circuit effect. Additionally, kinetic
simulations of the TTA-UC processes are conducted to aid understanding and optimization.
Finally, one TTA-UC system is also applied to chemical in-bond energy storage.
solar energy conversion
triplet-triplet annihilation
energy transfer
fluorescence anisotropy
anti-stokes
photon upconversion
excited state
porphyrins
photochemistry
photophysics
delayed fluorescence
dendrimers
anthracene
oligomers
spectroscopy
KA-salen, Kemigården 4, Chalmers University of Technology, Göteborg
Opponent: Prof. Jacek Waluk, Department of Photochemistry and Spectroscopy, Institute of Physical Chemistry, Polish Academy of Sciences, Poland