Plasmon-coupled circularly polarized luminescence: generation and enhancement

Abstract

In recent years, the investigation of chiral materials that exhibit circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) activity has gained significant attention due to their extensive range of potential applications. However, it remains challenging to obtain CPL-active molecules that possess both high luminescence dissymmetry factor (g_lum) and emission efficiency (Φ). Several strategies, such as molecular self-assembly or aggregation, triplet–triplet annihilation-based upconversion, and energy transfer or charge transfer hybrid complexes, have been proposed to address this issue. Nevertheless, most systems inevitably suffer from a trade-off between g_lum and Φ. So far, the local surface plasmonic resonance effect has been considered as a means to improve the overall performance of CPL due to its electromagnetic enhancement effect for chiral molecules. In this review, we present a systematic summary of recent advancements in CPL-active plasmonic materials and provide a brief perspective on their further development. We anticipate that plasmons will play an increasingly crucial role in the CPL research field. Therefore, we hope that our review will attract more researchers to this area.