The Gopalan Group focuses on using the tools of organic chemistry to design new polymeric materials. They are interested in implementing reactions, such as multicomponent reactions that are highly atom-efficient reactions but rarely used in polymer science to create new highly reactive but benign monomers and functional polymers. These polymeric materials have functional groups that impart electronic, electro-optic, dynamic reconfigurability, and biological functions. The classes of materials they study include conjugated polymers for carbon nanotube electronics, thermoplastic vitrimers, polymer brushes for surface/interfacial modification, block copolymer for self and directed self-assembly to create sub-10 nm features for microelectronics, and polymer coatings for stem cell biology.