The
design of high-performance luminescent MOF thermometers with
multi-operation modes has been long sought but remains a formidable
challenge. In this work, for the first time, we present a multimodal
luminescent ratiometric thermometer based on the single-lanthanide
metal–organic framework (MOF) DyTPTC-2Me (H4TPTC-2Me
= 2′,5′-dimethyl-[1,1′:4′,1″-terphenyl]-3,3″,5,5″-tetracarboxylic
acid). It not only has the characteristic luminescence of Dy3+ in which the atomic transitions from the 4I15/2 and 4F9/2 states (thermally coupled energy
levels, TCELs) are included but also emits ligand fluorescence due
to the efficient energy back-transfer of Dy3+ to the ligand,
thus allowing accurate non-invasive determination of temperature by
different modes. In particular, the TCEL-based emissions of the Dy3+ ions give ideal signals for measuring the temperature in
the 303–423 K range. The emissions of the ligand and Dy3+ (4F9/2 → 6H13/2) are used for temperature sensing in the range of 423
to 503 K. Both two modes feature promising thermometric performance,
including high relative sensitivity, high temperature resolution,
and excellent repeatability. Their combination is thus beneficial
to achieve more accurate temperature detection over a broad temperature
range, which can broaden the application scope of the ratiometric
luminescent thermometers.