Amplified circularly polarized luminescence promoted by hierarchical self-assembly involving Pt···Pt interactions

The design and construction of highly effective circularly polarized luminescence (CPL)-active materials has aroused considerable attention due to their widespread applications in sensors, optical devices, and asymmetric synthesis. However, the exploration of novel CPL-active materials with high luminescence dissymmetry factor (g_lum) values is still a challenge. Herein, we describe a new approach for the preparation of supramolecular metallacycles with amplified CPL promoted by hierarchical self-assembly involving Pt···Pt interactions. Notably, the resultant metallacycles exhibited strong CPL signals with high g_lum values, while their corresponding precursors were CPL silent. The CPL amplification mechanism was comprehensively validated by ultraviolet-visible absorption, emission spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations, and time-dependent density functional theory calculations. This work thus provides the first example of preparing highly effective CPL-active materials based on hierarchical self-assembly involving Pt···Pt interactions.