Phosphorescence selective expression in the development
of ultralong
organic room-temperature phosphorescence (UORTP) materials to enrich
the properties and functions of smart materials is a very interesting
topic but has not been realized yet due to the lack of organic phosphorescence
units. In this work, we, for the first time, investigate the selective
expression phenomenon of two organic phosphorescence units in a single
molecule. First, we report a new phosphorescence unit 7H-benzo[c]carbazole (BCz) with the advantage of simple synthesis.
BCz derivatives (PNBCz-1 and PNBCz-2) feature photoactivated green
ultralong phosphorescence in the PMMA film at room temperature, and
cation radicals are involved in the unique ultralong phosphorescence
behavior, which is similar to H-benzo[f]indole (Bd)
derivatives. Different from Bd, pure powders of BCz derivatives show
intense red-shifted ultralong phosphorescence at 77 K, probably due
to the extended π conjugated structure of BCz. Then, BCz and
Bd were incorporated into a single skeleton and two asymmetric molecules
(PNBCzBd-1 and PNBCzBd-2) were obtained. Surprisingly, in the PMMA
film, PNBCzBd-1 and PNBCzBd-2 both show photoactivated yellow ultralong
phosphorescence at room temperature assigned to the intrinsic phosphorescence
emission of Bd, and intrinsic green phosphorescence of BCz is almost
screened by Bd. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal
that the incorporation of Bd leads to the shifting of the phosphorescence
emission centers from BCz units to Bd units. Therefore, the intrinsic
phosphorescence emission of Bd is selectively expressed in the case
of PNBCzBd-1 and PNBCzBd-2. To our best knowledge, this is the first
example that reports the selective expression behavior of organic
phosphorescence units. We believe that this study may impact the future
research of UORTP materials and lay the foundation for their future
applications.