Versatile Prepolymer Platform for Controlled Tailoring of Quantum Dot Surface Properties.

Quantum dots (QDs) hold immense promise for bioimaging, yet technical challenges in surface engineering limit their wider scientific use. We introduce poly(pentafluorophenyl acrylate) (PPFPA) as a user-friendly prepolymer platform for creating precisely controlled multidentate polymeric ligands for QD surface engineering, accessible to researchers without extensive synthetic expertise. PPFPA combines the benefits of both bottom-up and prepolymer approaches, offering minimal susceptibility to hydrolysis and side reactions for controlled chemical composition, along with simple synthetic procedures using commercially available reagents.