ja4063019_si_001.pdf (1.34 MB)
Shaping Crystals with Light: Crystal-to-Crystal Isomerization and Photomechanical Effect in Fluorinated Azobenzenes
journal contribution
posted on 2016-02-18, 23:44 authored by Oleksandr
S. Bushuyev, Anna Tomberg, Tomislav Friščić, Christopher J. BarrettUnusually
long thermal half-lives of perhalogenated cis-azobenzenes
enabled their structural characterization and the first
evidence of a crystal-to-crystal cis → trans azobenzene isomerization. Irradiation with visible
light transforms a perhalogenated cis-azobenzene
single crystal into a polycrystalline aggregate of its trans-isomer in a photomechanical transformation that involves a significant,
controllable, and thermally irreversible change of crystal shape.
This is the first demonstration of permanent photomechanical modification
of crystal shape in an azobenzene.