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D. O. Sagdeev¹*, A. G. Shmelev², V. G. Nikiforov², A. A. Sukhanov², Yu. G. Galyametdinov¹

Author affiliations
¹Kazan National Research Technological University, Kazan, Russia
²Zavoisky Physical-Technical Institute, FRC Kazan Scientific Center of RAS, Kazan, Russia
*Corresponding author: demsagdi@yandex.ru

Abstract
The energy interactions that arise between the anisometric mesogenic gadolinium complex, which exhibits nematic and smectic liquid crystalline (LC) properties in certain temperature ranges, and paramagnetic quantum dots (QD) Cd_0.9Mn_0.1S/ZnS with “core-shell” structure, in the films obtained by melt crystallization between quartz glasses have been studied. QD and LC composites were prepared by codispersing of the components in toluene, followed by removal of the solvent. It has been shown that the luminescence intensity of the ligand environment of the complex increases significantly when it is doped with paramagnetic QDs as a result of partial energy transfer between the components. The effect of quantum dots doping on the liquid crystalline properties of the complex was also studied. The distribution of quantum dot aggregates in the LC matrix of the Gd(III) complex was studied by polarization optical microscopy. It is shown that the aggregates of quantum dots are uniformly distributed within the matrix of the complex.

Keywords: paramagnetic quantum dots, mesogenic complex, lanthanide complex, luminescent composites, energy transfer