Synthesis of o-Xylene-Organosilicon Hybrid Polymer and Its Optical Properties

We present synthesis of a new kind of organic-inorganic hybrid polymer, poly xylene-hexamethyltrisiloxane hybrid (PXS) by a new synthetic way from o-xylene and 1,1,3,3,5,5-hexamethyltrisiloxane. The merged molecular structure of the two monomeric components for the PXS polymer was confirmed by $^{13}C$- and $^1H$-NMR, and FT-IR. Its optical absorption and emission properties were investigated by UV-vis absorption and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. The PXS exhibits absorption at 265 nm which is the same with the o-xylene but tailing up to nearly 400 nm, which is maybe related the polymeric structure of the PXS. For the PL investigation, the PXS shows red-shift of the peak from 288 nm (o-xylene) to 372 nm in the case of excitation at 265 nm, at which both PXS and o-xylene have sufficiently high absorption for excitation. When 325-nm laser is used for excitation, the PXS shows a broader peak at 395 nm compared to the excitation at 265 nm and the o-xylene shows no luminescence probably due to the lack of absorption at 325 nm.