Lighting Up Bispyrene‐Functionalized Chiral Molecular Muscles with Switchable Circularly Polarized Excimer Emissions
Xue Li, Weitao Xu, Xiao‐Qin Xu, Yu Wang, Xu‐Qing Wang, Hai‐Bo Yang, Wei Wang
Abstract
Abstract Aiming at the further extension of the application scope of traditional molecular muscles, a novel bispyrene‐functionalized chiral molecular [c2]daisy chain was designed and synthesized. Taking advantage of the unique dimeric interlocked structure of molecular [c2]daisy chain, the resultant chiral molecular muscle emits strong circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) attributed to the pyrene excimer with a high dissymmetry factor ( g lum ) value of 0.010. More importantly, along with the solvent‐ or anion‐ induced motions of the chiral molecular muscle, the precise regulation of the pyrene stacking within its skeleton results in the switching towards either “inversed” state with sign inversion and larger g lum values or “down ” state with maintained handedness and smaller g lum values, making it a novel multistate CPL switch. As the first example of chiral molecular muscle‐based CPL switch, this proof‐of‐concept study not only successfully widens the application scopes of molecular muscles, but also provides a promising platform for the construction of novel smart chiral luminescent materials for practical applications.