

FOLLOWUS
a.South China Advanced Institute for Soft Matter Science and Technology, School of Emergent Soft Matter, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Functional and Intelligent Hybrid Materials and Devices, Guangdong Basic Research Center of Excellence for Energy and Information Polymer Materials, State Key Laboratory of Luminescent Materials and Devices, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510640, China
b.School of Chemical Engineering and Light Industry, Guangdong University of Technology, Guangzhou 510006, China
c.Guangdong Provincial Laboratory of Chemistry and Fine Chemical Engineering Jieyang Center, Jieyang 522031, China
yanyugao@gdut.edu.cn (Y.Y.G.)
zzhang@scut.edu.cn (Z.L.Z.)
lingewang@scut.edu.cn (L.G.W.)
Received:08 October 2025,
Revised:2025-11-09,
Accepted:17 November 2025,
Published Online:16 January 2026,
Published:05 February 2026
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Liu, Z. Y.; Gao, Y. Y.; Wang, C.; Yu, Q. Q.; Zhang, Z. L.; Wang, L. G. Achieving enhanced optical transparency and low-dielectric properties in meta-substituted copolyimides for flexible substrates. Chinese J. Polym. Sci. 2026, 44, 341–351
Zi-Yang Liu, Yan-Yu Gao, Cheng Wang, et al. Achieving Enhanced Optical Transparency and Low-dielectric Properties in Meta-substituted Copolyimides for Flexible Substrates[J]. Chinese Journal of Polymer Science, 2026, 44(2): 341-351.
Liu, Z. Y.; Gao, Y. Y.; Wang, C.; Yu, Q. Q.; Zhang, Z. L.; Wang, L. G. Achieving enhanced optical transparency and low-dielectric properties in meta-substituted copolyimides for flexible substrates. Chinese J. Polym. Sci. 2026, 44, 341–351 DOI: 10.1007/s10118-025-3505-5.
Zi-Yang Liu, Yan-Yu Gao, Cheng Wang, et al. Achieving Enhanced Optical Transparency and Low-dielectric Properties in Meta-substituted Copolyimides for Flexible Substrates[J]. Chinese Journal of Polymer Science, 2026, 44(2): 341-351. DOI: 10.1007/s10118-025-3505-5.
In this work
five colorless polyimides films exhibite concurrent low dielectric constant and high transparency
making them suitable candidates for next-generation flexible electronic substrates.
The development of high-performance transparent substrates is critical for next-generation flexible electronic devices. Herein
we designed two novel meta-substituted diamines incorporating trifluoromethyl (―CF
3
) and methyl (―CH
3
) groups to synthesize colorless copolyimide (CPI) films
via
copolymerization with 4
4′-(hexafluoroisopropylidene)diphthalic anhydride (6FDA)/3
3′
4
4′-biphenyltetracarboxylic dianhydride (BPDA). The combination of meta-substituted architecture and substituents enables the simultaneous attainment of an ultralow dielectric constant (
D
k
) and high transparency. The meta-substitution geometry and electronic effects of ―CF
3
/―CH
3
effectively suppressed charge-transfer complex (CTC) formation
expanded fractional free volume (FFV)
and restricted
π
-electron conjugation
as validated by DFT calculations and wide-angle X-ray diffraction (WAXD) analysis. The optimized CPI film (PIA
1
-6FDA/BPDA(10/0)) achieved outstanding transmittance (
T
450
=88.15%)
ultralow dielectric constant (
D
k
=2.08 at 1 kHz)
and minimal dielectric loss (
D
f
=0.0012)
while maintaining robust thermal stability (
T
d5%
>
523 °C) and mechanical strength (
σ
= 87.5 MPa). This work establishes a molecular engineering strategy to concurrently enhance the optical and dielectric properties
positioning meta-substituted CPIs as promising candidates for transparent flexible devic
es.
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