The experiment is designed for a junior-level materials engineering and chemistry laboratory course. Students from different disciplines will work together to create semiconducting polymers and measure the photoluminescence spectra of each. Each group will design a series of experiments involving one processing variable. After creating each polymer, they will measure and compare the photoluminescence spectrum.

This experiment builds on the two previously proposed experiments. The unique feature is that it involves interdisciplinary teams of students that are addressing an open-ended problem (the impact of a processing variable on the optical properties). It gives them an opportunity to practice experimental design and mathematical modeling of the results.

The procedure consists of designing a series of experiments that involve processing changes to the polymer, performing the experiments and measuring the resulting photoluminescence spectra. This will be followed by mathematical modeling of their results to determine the impact of the changes in process variables.

Prepared by Linda Vanasupa and David Braun of Cal Poly State University, San Luis Obispo.
See http://www.ee.calpoly.edu/~dbraun/polyelec/