An erasable photo-patterning material based on a specially designed 4-(1,2,2-triphenylvinyl)aniline salicylaldehyde hydrazone aggregation-induced emission (AIE) molecule

Abstract

Luminescent molecules with photochromic properties show strong potential in molecular switches, molecular logic gates, photo-controllable materials, bio-imaging, anti-counterfeiting, photo-patterning, etc. However, research is still scarce in such molecules exhibiting reversible photo-controllable color and fluorescence changes in solid states, which is due to the aggregation-caused quenching (ACQ) effect of most luminogens. In this work, a reversible photochromic molecule (1) with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) properties was developed. Compound 1 exhibits typical AIE properties as a result of restricted intramolecular rotation (RIR) and excited-state intramolecular proton transfer (ESIPT) processes. As a photochromic molecule, compound 1 shows reversible color and fluorescence changes upon UV light irradiation with good fatigue resistance. More importantly, the conversion rate from its irradiated form to its initial form is controllable by temperature and long wavelength light irradiation, which makes it suitable for photo-patterning materials with erasable properties.