ABSTRACT
This chapter presents advances in multifunctional conjugated polymers with helical structures and chiroptical properties. It discusses polymer spherulites consisting of helically p-stacked ionic conjugated polymers exhibiting circularly polarized blue luminescence. The chapter presents photochemically switchable red, green, or blue and white illuminants based on conjugated polymer nanospheres. It explains hierarchically controlled helical carbon and graphite films prepared from chemically doped conjugated polymer films using morphology-retaining carbonization. Conjugated polymers possess profound semiconducting properties, such as electrical conductivity, luminescence, and photo-harvesting behavior because of their p-electrons delocalized over the main chain, and are therefore regarded as candidate materials for organic optoelectronic devices. Helical p-conjugated polymers have attracted increasing interest because of their potentially profound electro-optical properties, which might be applied to next-generation plastic electronics. The spherulite is a spherical semicrystalline material with a radiated structure in which both crystalline and amorphous regions coexist. Conjugated polymers have semiconducting and luminescent properties, organic field-effect transistors, photovoltaic cells, and chemical biosensors.
