Activated circularly polarized luminescence in a chiral supramolecular template triggered by electrostatic and arene–perfluoroarene interactions

Abstract

The approaches to the generation of circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) signals have attracted much interest due to the potential application of CPL materials in information encryption and three-dimensional displays. However, most strategies mainly depend on the rational design and complicated synthesis of chiral fluorophores, highlighting the great significance of developing a facile and novel strategy for designing CPL materials. Herein, we employed the classical benzene-1,3,5-tricarboxamide-based chiral compound D/L-cC₃ as a supramolecular template to co-assemble with a pyrene-based fluorophore (Py0 or Py1) and octafluoronaphthalene (OFN). The supramolecular template D/L-cC₃ could not effectively induce the chirality of Py derivatives through electrostatic interactions. Importantly, chiral optical properties emerged in the ternary co-assembly system D/L-cC₃-Py1-OFN through electrostatic and arene–perfluoroarene (AP) interactions, with a |g_lum| value of 5.1 × 10⁻³. These findings reveal that the chiral induction from a chiral supramolecular template to an achiral fluorophore may be ineffective through electrostatic interaction, and the joint effect of electrostatic and AP interactions provides a facile way for the generation of CPL properties.