Photoinduced Betaine Generation for Efficient Photothermal Energy Conversion

Abstract

The conversion of solar energy to thermal, chemical, or electrical energya ttracts great attentioni nc hemistry and physics. There has been ac onsiderable effort for the efficient extraction of photons throughout the entires olar spectrum. In this work light energy was efficiently harvested by using al ong-lived betaine photogeneratedfrom an acridinium-based electron donor-acceptor dyad. The photothermal energy-conversion efficiency of the dyad is significantly enhanced by simultaneousi llumination with blue (420-440 nm) andy ellow (> 480 nm) light in comparison with the sum of the conversione fficiencies for individual illumination with blue or yellow light. The enhanced photothermal effect is due to the photogenerated betaine, which absorbs longer-wavelength light than the dyad, and thus the dyadbetaine combination is promising for efficient photothermal energyc onversion. The mechanismso fb etaine generation and energy conversiona re discussed on the basis of steadystate and transient spectral measurements.Supporting information and the ORCID identification number(s) for the author(s) of this article can be found under: https://doi.

Near-infrared light control of membrane potential by an electron donor–acceptor linked molecule

“…This level of change is expectedly large enough to trigger various cellular events such as neural firing. 17 MTT-assay confirmed that the current experimental conditions (i.e. the concentration of Triad-NMe3 and intensity of the NIR light) did not cause any significant cytotoxicity on PC12 cells (Fig.…”

“…1) were designed, synthesized, and characterized to attain efficient NIRlight control on the cell membrane potential. Although the photophysical properties of many donor-acceptor linked molecules have been intensively investigated so far, [14][15][16][17] the effective use of a photoinduced charge-separated (pCS) state generated by the NIR light is yet to be realized. Therefore, the present study demonstrates a systematical investigation on Triad-NMe3 and its reference compounds (Figs.…”

“…18 The transient huge electric field (~10 6 V cm -1 ) was found to influence the membrane potential and ion channels in the living cells. [16][17][18][19] Most of the molecules would be deactivated, and some would lead to electron transfer with the surrounding molecules. 20 In our previous study, however, the use of potentially harmful blue light would hamper further developments of this light control method for practical applications.…”

“…The quantum yield of the final pCS state (ΦCS) can be determined by comparing intensities of the peaks arising from the fullerene anion (C60 •-) between Triad and ref-Triad (ΦCS = 99 %). 17 The yield of pCS of Triad is estimated to be 31 %. Alternatively, the ΦCS value can be calculated from the obtained kinetic rate constants (see the ESI for the detail) based on Scheme S1.…”

Caging and photo-triggered uncaging of singlet oxygen by excited state engineering of electron donor–acceptor-linked molecular sensors

“…3 a). It is also inductive the intramolecular electron transfer is not feasible because the anthracenyl moiety is not involved in the frontier orbitals 32 . To understand the excited states and the photoinduced transition pathway, the excitation energies and natural transition orbital (NTO) analyses were studied (Fig.…”