om5b00447_si_003.pdf (2.23 MB)
Highly Selective Detection of H+ and OH– with a Single-Emissive Iridium(III) Complex: A Mild Approach to Conversion of Non-AIEE to AIEE Complex
journal contribution
posted on 2015-09-28, 00:00 authored by Parvej Alam, Gurpreet Kaur, Amrit Sarmah, Ram Kinkar Roy, Angshuman
Roy Choudhury, Inamur Rahaman LaskarA greenish-blue emissive bis-cyclometalated
iridium(III) complex
with octahedral geometry was synthesized in a convenient route where
a bulky substituted ligand, N1-tritylethane-1,2-diamine ligand (trityl-based rotating unit) (L1), was coordinated to iridium(III)
in nonchelating mode, [Ir(F2ppy)2(L1)(Cl)], [F2ppy = 2-(2′,4′-difluoro)phenylpyridine; L1 = N1-tritylethane-1,2-diamine], 1. The purpose of introducing
a rotor in 1 was anticipated to initiate aggregation-induced
emission (AIE) activity in it. The presence of a secondary amine in L1 has attributed to 1 the ability to sense acids. The mechanism of this change in 1 under acidic medium was explored. A bright yellow emissive
complex was formed on exposing 1 to hydroxide ion, which
was isolated, characterized, and identified as a new aggregation-induced
enhanced emission (AIEE) active complex. The detection limit of hydroxide
ion was determined to 126 nM. Ground- and excited-state properties
of 1 were investigated using DFT- and TD-DFT-based calculations,
and several important aspects of the experimental facts were validated.