In-Situ Crafting a Class of Polymer Nanocomposites By Capitalizing on Nonlinear Block Copolymer Nanoreactors

Herein, I will discuss several robust strategies to in-situ access monodisperse 0D 1D, shish-kebab, and Janus polymer-ligated nanocrystals, regarded as nanocomposites, by capitalizing on an array of rationally designed unimolecular star-like, bottlebrush-like, worm-like, and Janus block copolymers, respectively, as nanoreactors. These four strategies are effective and able to produce oil-soluble and water-soluble monodisperse nanocrystals, including metallic, ferroelectric, magnetic, luminescent, semiconductor, perovskite, and their core/shell structures, which represent a few examples of the kind of nanocrystals that can be produced using these techniques. The applications of these functional nanocrystals in energy conversion and storage (e.g., perovskite solar cells, LEDs, thermoelectrics, ferroelectrics, batteries, and electrocatalysis) will also be presented.