Use of 3-hydroxyflavone as a fluorescence probe for the controlled photopolymerization of the E-Shell 300 polymer

Abstract

Photopolymerization process of the photo-reactive acrylate-based E-Shell 300 biocompatible polymers doped with 3-hydroxyflavone (3-HF) molecules have been studied. It was found that the spectra of these complexes manifest two intensive fluorescence bands, the short-wavelength band of the E-Shell 300 autofluoresence and the long-wavelength emission band of the probe tautomer.The intensity and the relative quantum yield of 3-HF long-wavelength green band grew by 1.8 times during polymerization. They were characterized by continuous and single-valued response function to the polymerization progress. The function may be used as an indicator suitable for photopolymerization monitoring.Moreover, time-resolved measurements of the emission lifetimes showed significant difference between 3-HF emission lifetime in low viscous solvent (0.9 ns)) and in polymerized sample (3.2 ns)) which also can be applied in control of photopolymerization. 3-HF is a relatively cheap, non-toxic and has good solubility in the polymer media we chose.