Light-emitting materials, especially those with tunable wavelengths, attract considerable attention for applications in optoelectronic devices, fluorescent probes, sensors and so on. Many species evaluated for these purposes either emit as a dilute solution or on aggregation, with the former often self-quenching at high concentrations, and the latter falling dark when aggregation is disrupted. Here we preserve emissive behaviour at both low- and high-concentration regimes for two discrete supramolecular coordination complexes (SCCs). These tetragonal prismatic SCCs are self-assembled on mixing a metal acceptor, Pt(PEt₃)₂(OSO₂CF₃)₂, with two organic donors, a pyridyl-decorated ​tetraphenylethylene and one of two ​benzene dicarboxylate species. The rigid organization of these fluorescence-active ligands imparts an emissive behaviour to dilute solutions of the resulting assemblies. Furthermore, on aggregation the prisms exhibit variable-wavelength visible-light emission, including rare white-light emission in ​tetrahydrofuran. The favourable photophysical properties and solvent-dependent aggregation behaviour provide a means to tune emission wavelengths.

http://www.nature.com/nchem/journal/v7/n4/full/nchem.2201.html

Nature Chemistry 7, 342–348 (2015) doi:10.1038/nchem.2201