Structural and energetic properties of pentacene derivatives and heterostructures

Das Ziel der Arbeit ist die Herstellung und die Charakterisierung von Heterostrukturen des organischen Halbleiters Pentazen (PEN) mit diversen konjugierten organischen Materialien im Hinblick auf das Anwendungspotenzial im Bereich der organischen Elektronik. Für die Untersuchung von PEN-Heterostrukturen mit (i) Fulleren (C60), (ii) Perfluoropentazen (PFP) und (iii) 6,13-Pentazenchinon (PQ) wurden mehrere komplementäre experimentelle Techniken angewendet: Röntgenbeugung, Schwingungsspektroskopie, Rasterkraftmikroskopie und Photoelektronenspektroskopie. (i) Für PEN - Heterostrukturen mit C60 wurden die elektronischen, strukturellen und morphologischen Eigenschaften mit der Leistung von organischen Solarzellen (OSZ) für geschichtete und gemischte Systeme korreliert. Dabei wurde gezeigt, dass morphologische anstatt struktureller oder energetischer Ursachen die Leistungsunterschiede der beiden untersuchten Zelltypen erklären. (ii) Strukturuntersuchungen wurden an reinen PFP-Filmen, sowie an geschichteten und gemischten Heterostrukturen mit PEN durchgeführt. Es wurde die Struktur der PFP-Dünnfilmphase gelöst und das Wachstum von PEN+PFP Mischkristallen gezeigt, welche erfolgreich angewandt wurden, um die Ionisationsenergie (IE) des Films mit dem Mischungsverhältnis durchzustimmen. Dies wurde durch die Existenz von innermolekularen polaren Bindungen (C-H und C-F für PEN und PFP) erklärt. (iii) Für reine PQ-Filme wurde die Struktur der PQ-Dünnfilmphase gelöst (ein Molekül pro Einheitszelle). Es wurde eine stark orientierungsabhängige IE von PQ und PEN gefunden und gezeigt, dass die Energieniveaulagen für die Anwendung in OSZ geeignet sind. Die Untersuchung von Mischsystemen zeigte phasensepariertes Wachstum ohne Hinweise auf Interkalation, selbst bei PQ Konzentrationen von nur 2%. Weiters wurde gezeigt, dass O2 und Wasser keine nachhaltigen Auswirkungen auf PEN-Filme zeigen, wohingegen Singlett-Sauerstoff und Ozon diese angreifen und flüchtige Reaktionsprodukte liefern.The scope of this work is the combination of the organic semiconductor pentacene (PEN) with different conjugated organic molecules to form application relevant heterostructures in vacuum sublimed films. Using x-ray diffraction (XRD), vibrational spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy and photoelectron spectroscopy, PEN heterostructures with (i) fullerene (C60), (ii) perfluoropentacene (PFP) and (iii) 6,13-pentacenequinone (PQ) were thoroughly characterized to judge on the respective application potential in organic electronics. (i) PEN heterostructures with C60 were investigated regarding the correlation of energetic, structural and morphological properties with the performance of organic photovoltaic cells (OPVCs) for both layered and mixed structures. Morphological rather than energetic or structural issues account for performance differences of bulk-heterojunction OPVCs compared to layered devices. (ii) XRD investigations were carried out on pure PFP films, on layered and mixed heterostructures with PEN. The thin-film polymorph of PFP was solved and it is shown that blended films form a mixed crystal structure, which led to the finding that the ionization energy (IE) of organic films composed of molecules with intramolecular polar bonds (like C-H and C-F for PEN and PFP, respectively) can be tuned through the mixing ratio. (iii) A so far unknown thin-film polymorph of PQ on SiO2 substrates was solved using XRD reciprocal space mapping evidencing a loss of the herringbone arrangement known from the PQ bulk structure. For PEN heterostructures with PQ a highly molecular-orientation dependent IE and energy level offsets interesting for the use in OPVCs were found. Mixed films of PEN and PQ exhibit phase separation and no intercalation was found even at PQ concentrations as low as 2%. Finally, it is shown that O2 and water do not react noticeably with PEN, whereas singlet oxygen and ozone readily oxidize PEN films producing volatile reaction products instead of PQ

Doping-related broadening of the density of states governs integer-charge transfer in P3HT

Molecular p-doping allows for an increase in the conductivity of organic semiconductors, which is regularly exploited in thermoelectric devices. Upon doping, integer and fractional charge transfer have been identified as the two competing mechanisms to occur, where the former is desired to promote the generation of mobile holes in the semiconductor host. In general, high dopant electron affinity is expected to promote integer-charge transfer, while strong coupling between the frontier molecular orbitals of dopant and host promotes fractional charge transfer instead. Here, we investigate the role that the width of the density of states (DOS) plays in the doping process by doping the conjugated polymer poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) with tetracyanoquinodimethane (TCNQ) derivatives of different electron affinities at a 2% dopant ratio. Cyclic voltammetry confirms that only the electron affinity of F4TCNQ (tetrafluorotetracyanoquinodimethane) exceeds the ionization energy of P3HT, while TCNQ and FTCNQ (2-fluoro-7,7,8,8-tetracyanoquinodimethane) turn out to have significantly lower but essentially identical electron affinities. From infrared spectroscopy, we learn, however, that ca. 88% of FTCNQ is ionized while all of TCNQ is not. This translates into P3HT conductivities that are increased for F4TCNQ and FTCNQ doping, but surprisingly even reduced for TCNQ doping. To understand the remarkable discrepancy between TCNQ and FTCNQ, we calculated the percentage of ionized dopants and the hole densities in the P3HT matrix resulting from varied widths of the P3HT highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO)-DOS via a semi-classical computational approach. We find that broadening of the DOS can yield the expected ionization percentages only if the dopants have significantly different tendencies to cause energetic disorder in the host matrix. In particular, while for TCNQ the doping behavior is well reproduced if the recently reported width of the P3HT HOMO-DOS is used, it must be broadened by almost one order of magnitude to comply with the ionization ratio determined for FTCNQ. Possible reasons for this discrepancy lie in the presence of a permanent dipole in FTCNQ, which highlights that electron affinities alone are not sufficient to define the strength of molecular dopants and their capability to perform integer-charge transfer with organic semiconductors

Galanin pathogenic mutations in temporal lobe epilepsy

Temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is a common epilepsy syndrome with a complex etiology. Despite evidence for the participation of genetic factors, the genetic basis of TLE remains largely unknown. A role for the galanin neuropeptide in the regulation of epileptic seizures has been established in animal models more than two decades ago. However, until now there was no report of pathogenic mutations in GAL, the galanin-encoding gene, and therefore its role in human epilepsy was not established. Here, we studied a family with a pair of monozygotic twins affected by TLE and two unaffected siblings born to healthy parents. Exome sequencing revealed that both twins carried a novel de novo mutation (p.A39E) in the GAL gene. Functional analysis revealed that the p.A39E mutant showed antagonistic activity against galanin receptor 1 (GalR1)-mediated response, and decreased binding affinity and reduced agonist properties for GalR2. These findings suggest that the p.A39E mutant could impair galanin signaling in the hippocampus, leading to increased glutamatergic excitation and ultimately to TLE. In a cohort of 582 cases, we did not observe any pathogenic mutations indicating that mutations in GAL are a rare cause of TLE. The identification of a novel de novo mutation in a biologically-relevant candidate gene, coupled with functional evidence that the mutant protein disrupts galanin signaling, strongly supports GAL as the causal gene for the TLE in this family. Given the availability of galanin agonists which inhibit seizures, our findings could potentially have direct implications for the development of anti-epileptic treatmen

Veränderte Herzfrequenzvariabilität als früher Indikator für subakute Infektionen nach ischämischem Mediainfarkt

Die vorliegende Arbeit wurde als Machbarkeitsstudie zur Methodenetablierung bezüglich der Prognose von Infektionen mittels veränderter Herzfrequenzvariabilität (HRV) nach ischämischem Mediainfarkt konzipiert. Die Herzfrequenzvariabilität gibt Rückschlüsse bezüglich eines veränderten Zustands des autonomen Nervensystems bzw. ermöglicht Einblicke in dessen Regulation