LEPDICT’s 3rd stage (2022) sequentially or concurrently engaged in various tasks: (i) synthesis/acquisition of precursors, intermediates, monomers and/or polymers with specific characteristics; (ii) purification of solvents, reagents, precursors, intermediates, monomers, polymers (when necessary); (iii) optimization of preparation procedures involved in the development of active materials (when necessary); (iv) structural and physico-chemical evaluation of resulting compounds, with emphasis on electro-optical properties, processability and structure-properties correlations; (v) preparation/acquisition of raw materials  and/or auxiliary components for lab-scale PLEDs; (vi) design and fabrication of lab-scale PLED prototypes, with emission in the blue, respectively white range; (vii) physico-chemical assessment of the prototypes, with a focus on their emissive conduct; (viii) building correlations between design/components/fabrication and properties/optical response; (ix) optimization of PLEDs’ preparation process (when necessary) with a focus on enhancing the compatibility between the prototype’s structural elements, increasing efficiency, and tailoring the output color balance; (x) selecting the best performing PLEDs; (xi) support activities: dissemination and participation at scientific events.
 

The synthetic and analytical efforts from this stage were based on the use of fine organic synthesis, polymer chemistry and physics, and materials science (centered on the design and selection of compatible structural elements, identification of the most favorable blueprint and experimental conditions related to synthesis, design, fabrication, and optimization of PLEDs with specific optical response) as productive instruments to finely tune the proportion and interactions between emissive species, manage the color of emitted light and optimize the optical behavior at both (macro)molecular and PLED level.
 

Most of the performed activities focused on: (i) identifying the optimal combination of active structural building blocks (chromophoric structural segments) in the same macromolecular medley to successfully develop polymer-based materials able to emit light of a certain color, (ii) testing and validating active polymeric materials in PLED prototypes. The development directions also involved an extensive, multi-level optimization process to achieve a light emission with a satisfactory degree of purity both in the developed active materials as well as in the PLED prototypes built from them. 
 

Two series of luminescent polymer materials (one active polymeric material incorporating emissive species in the red, green, and blue range, respectively; two active polymeric materials incorporating emissive species in the blue and orange range, respectively) and three sets of PLED prototypes (two lab-scale, PLED prototypes with emission in the blue range; 13 lab-scale PLED prototypes, with emission in the white range, 9 of which were then optimized) were developed and tested in this fashion. 

Some of the results obtained throughout the project were disseminated in Stage 3 in the form of 4 presentations at 2 international scientific events, and as 1 national patent application. 

2 Short training stages were also carried out for 2 of the team members (1 PhD student member).

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