Photoactivatable europium luminescence turn-on by photo-oxygenation of β-diketone having pyrrole rings

Abstract

This work demonstrates a novel photoactivatable turn-on-type lanthanide(III) luminescence. A β-diketone substrate having redox-active pyrrole moieties (LH₂) undergoes efficient photo-oxygenation to afford the corresponding α-alkoxy diketone (LHOH) in the presence of lanthanide(III) ions, which trigger bright europium(III) red luminescence (PA-Eu^III) turn-on, as well as activating the near-infrared luminescence (λ_em = 976 nm) of ytterbium(III). A photo-patterning process for security imaging is successfully demonstrated.