journal article·2026-02

Engineering Color‐Tunable Photochromic Ultra‐Long Room Temperature Phosphorescence Polymer Films by Regulating Intramolecular Charge Transfer of Nonlinear Pyridinium Units

Xiao Ma, Yue‐Zhao Zhu, Hui‐Juan Wang, Yu‐Jie Mao, Peiyang Gu, Shiyuan Zhou, Fu‐Rong Lin, Run‐Pu Shen, Chao‐Yang Liu, Liang‐Jin Xu

Advanced Functional Materials· Volume 36· Issue 15
Publisher page

Abstract

Abstract Dynamic photochromic ultra‐long room‐temperature phosphorescent (URTP) materials are promising for advanced anti‐counterfeiting and information encryption due to their stimuli‐responsive, tunable optical properties. However, developing high‐performance, color‐tunable photochromic URTP polymers with clear mechanistic insight remains challenging. Here, this is addressed by strategically embedding nonlinear pyridinium units—capable of tunable intramolecular charge transfer (ICT)—into a rigid polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) matrix. Spectroscopic analyses reveal that photoexcitation induces ICT‐driven charge separation, forming long‐lived triplet charge‐transfer (CT) states with distinct energy, enabling multicolor URTP emission. The PVA matrix stabilizes these triplet CT states and facilitates CT‐mediated electron transfer from hydroxyl groups to pyridinium acceptors, generating stable radicals responsible for reversible photochromism. Furthermore, cross‐linking the pyridinium‐doped PVA networks with boric acid simultaneously enhances the phosphorescence lifetime (up to 0.96 s) and quantum efficiency (up to 27.8%) while preserving high‐contrast reversible photochromic behavior. These multifunctional films demonstrate applications in multilevel anti‐counterfeiting, rewritable patterning, and secure information encryption. This work provides a robust design strategy for stimuli‐responsive photochromic URTP polymers.
Source: crossref · Quality: baseline

Research context

OpenAlex topics: Luminescence and Fluorescent Materials · Photochromic and Fluorescence Chemistry · Polydiacetylene-based materials and applications

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

Affiliations

Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Advanced Catalytic Materials and Technology Advanced Catalysis and Green Manufacturing Collaborative Innovation Center School of Petrochemical Engineering Changzhou University Changzhou Jiangsu 213164 China

State Key Laboratory of Magnetic Resonance and Atomic and Molecular Physics Wuhan Center for Magnetic Resonance Innovation Academy for Precision Measurement Science and Technology Chinese Academy of Sciences Wuhan 430071 China

State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter Chinese Academy of Science Fuzhou 350002 China

School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering Zhejiang Engineering Research Center of Fat‐soluble Vitamin Shaoxing University Shaoxing 312000 China

Funding

Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions · Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province · National Key Research and Development Program of China · National Natural Science Foundation of China

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