ORGANIC CHEMISTRY UNIT

The Organic Chemistry Unit is devoted to the synthesis of organic molecules with optoelectronic and/or biothecnological applications. With this purpose in mind, we use several scaffolds like phthalocyanines, perylenediimides, diketopyrrolopyrroles, fullerenes, nanotubes and other carbon nanoforms, graphene, MoS2… which after structural modification are transformed into valuable building blocks for the preparation of organic or hybrid solar cells, artificial photosynthetic systems, organic dye lasers, sensors, dual imaging agents, metallodrugs…

GROUPS

The BioEngineering Institute of the Miguel Hernández University has different groups of Organic Chemistry:

Molecular Synthesis

Since their discovery, perylenediimides (PDIs) have attracted much attention thanks to their strong absorption of visible light, their high fluorescence quantum yields and their thermal, chemical and photochemical stabilities. Another turn of the screw occurred with the advent of the organic optoelectronics, as PDIs revealed themselves as excellent electron transporting materials with high electron affinities. As a result of all the above, they have been exhaustively studied in solar cells (organic, dye-sensitized and perovskite-based), light-emitting devices, lasers, field-effect transistors, artificial photosynthetic systems, sensors and in different biological applications.

Molecular Design

Our principal objective is the synthesis and supramolecular organization of electroactive systems based on phthalocyanines (Pcs) and dicetopyrrolopyrroles (DPPs) as artificial Photosynthetic Systems, for molecular Photovoltaic and Anticancer Treatment.
Pcs are porphyrin analogues with, generally, planar structure and high conjugation of the central ring (18 π-electrons). They present interesting properties for application in photovoltaic cells, especially strong absorbance in the visible and near infrared radiation region and high thermal and chemical stabilities. On the other hand, DPPs possess exceptional absorbance properties in the 500-600 nm region, strong fluorescent performance besides a great stability. A common feature of DPP-based materials is their relatively high oxidation potential, leading to high-energy charge-separated states when combined with acceptor systems and correspondingly high voltages are obtained in solar cells. For these reasons DPPs, either as polymers or as single molecules, are being investigated as active layer on different OPV devices.