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Published on: April 22, 2016
Reversible Single-Crystal-to-Single-Crystal Transformation of a Coordination Polymer through Solar-Switchable
Ni-Ya Li1, Bo Liu1, Zhao-Wei Zhang1
1Jiangsu Key Laboratory for Chemistry of Low-Dimensional Materials, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Huaiyin Normal University, Huaian 223300, P. R. China.
Abstract:
Reversible covalent reactions within crystalline complexes are powerful tools for the design and developing of new generation of reusable smart materials. In this work, a unique photoreactive olefin-containing metal-organic coordination polymer [Ag2(2,3-ppe)2(1,3-bdc)] (1) was prepared by the hydrothermal reaction between AgNO3, 1-(2-pyridyl)-2-(3-pyridyl)ethylene (2,3-ppe), and 1,3-benzenedicarboxylic acid (1,3-H2bdc). When exposed to sunlight, 1 can undergo single-crystal-to-single-crystal (SCSC) transformation to form [Ag2(dpdpcb)(1,3-bdc)] (1a, dpdpcb = 1,3-di(2-pyridyl)-2,4-di(3-pyridyl)cyclobutane) through a [2 + 2] cycloaddition reaction. 1a can regenerate into 1 via the cycloreversion reaction based on the thermal effect of sunlight. Such a metal-organic complex exhibits interesting fluorescence switching behavior during the unprecedented fully solar-controlled reversible SCSC reaction, which makes it possible to be applied to the fields of optical memory storage and anti-counterfeiting.
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