title: Absence of photoinduced charge transfer in blends of PbSe quantum dots and conjugated polymers.
abstract: We use photoluminescence (PL) quenching and photoinduced absorption (PIA) spectroscopy to study charge transfer in bulk heterojunction blends of PbSe quantum dots with the semiconducting polymers poly-3-hexylthiophene (P3HT) and poly[2-methoxy-5-(3',7'-dimethyloctyloxy)-para-phenylene vinylene] (MDMO-PPV). PIA spectra from the PbSe blends are compared to spectra from similar blends of the polymers with phenyl-C(61)-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) and blends with CdSe quantum dots. We find that the MDMO-PPV PL is quenched, and the PL lifetime is shortened upon addition of PbSe quantum dots, while the PL of the P3HT is unaffected upon blending. However, for PbSe blends with both polymers, the PIA spectra show very little polaronic signal, suggesting that few, if any, long-lived charges are being produced by photoinduced charge transfer.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195-1700, USA.
authors.forename: Kevin M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Noone
authors.forename: Nicholas C
authors.initials: NC
authors.lastname: Anderson
authors.forename: Noah E
authors.initials: NE
authors.lastname: Horwitz
authors.forename: Andrea M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Munro
authors.forename: Abhishek P
authors.initials: AP
authors.lastname: Kulkarni
authors.forename: David S
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Ginger