Toward a simple way for a mechanochromic luminescent material with high contrast ratio and fatigue resistance: Implication for information storage

Jingdan Hou; Xiuyuan Wu; Wenting Sun; Yuai Duan; Yang Liu; Tianyu Han; Zhongfeng Li

doi:10.1016/j.saa.2019.02.069

Toward a simple way for a mechanochromic luminescent material with high contrast ratio and fatigue resistance: Implication for information storage

Spectrochim Acta A Mol Biomol Spectrosc. 2019 May 5:214:348-354. doi: 10.1016/j.saa.2019.02.069. Epub 2019 Feb 19.

Authors

Jingdan Hou¹, Xiuyuan Wu¹, Wenting Sun¹, Yuai Duan¹, Yang Liu², Tianyu Han³, Zhongfeng Li⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Chemistry, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China.
² Beijing Key Laboratory of Radiation Advanced Materials, Beijing Research Center for Radiation Application, 100015 Beijing, China.
³ Department of Chemistry, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China. Electronic address: phanw@163.com.
⁴ Department of Chemistry, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China. Electronic address: lizf@cnu.edu.cn.

PMID: 30798217
DOI: 10.1016/j.saa.2019.02.069

Abstract

In this work, we present the synthesis and photoluminescence (PL) behaviour of a new compound, DHNC. The molecular design includes twisted conformation and the incorporation of electron donor (D) and acceptor (A) pairs, which endows the compound with both twisted intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) and aggregation-induced emission (AIE) properties. Importantly, the compound exhibits mechanochromic luminescence (MCL): The emission of the crystalline powder shows strong green emission but turns into orange-red with an obvious quenching effect after grinding, demonstrating a high contrast ratio. The emission of the ground sample can be rejuvenated though recrystallization by either immersion or fumigation in common organic solvents. The emission can be reversibly switched between two states for more than 10 cycles, showing fatigue resistance. In a quantitative mechanical experiment, the DHNC-loaded film has a remarkable emission loss with the external force up to 67.9 Mpa, showing high sensitivity. An archetype of information storage is developed based on this MCL material, which uses mechanical force to write information and organic vapour to erase. Letters and cartoon pictures can be written and erased repeatedly on the DHNC-loaded film, indicating high contrast ratio and fatigue resistance.

Keywords: Aggregation-induced emission; Information storage; Intramolecular charge transfer; Mechanochromic luminescence.