We are currently investigating the excited-state dynamics of a molecular rotor synthesized by the Rickhaus group in the Department of Organic Chemistry at our university. Upon S1 ← S0 excitation, the investigated molecule (A) rapidly reaches a conical intersection (CI) on the S1 potential energy surface and subsequently undergoes branching on the sub-picosecond timescale to yield both the initial compound (A) and the rotated conformer about the central axle of the molecule (B).
For classical molecular rotors, the conformer B is sufficiently stable to enable photoaccumulation under steady-state illumination and its thermal back-conversion (B → A) is slow enough to be resolved by NMR spectroscopy. In contrast, for the molecular rotor investigated here, conformer B undergoes rapid thermal interconversion back to A with a lifetime of approximately 2 ns, as revealed by our transient absorption measurements.
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Contact:
Eric Vauthey
Physical Chemistry Department - Sciences II - University of Geneva
30, Quai Ernest Ansermet - CH-1211 Geneva 4 (Switzerland)
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