Aggregation-induced emission (AIE)-active highly emissive novel carbazole-based dyes with various solid-state fluorescence and reversible mechanofluorochromism characteristics

Three new carbazole-based fluorescent molecules 1–3 functionalized with tetraphenylethene have been successfully synthesized, and these compounds have high thermal stability, and they exhibited different fluorescence in solid states with the superior luminescence quantum yields of 99.04% (1), 98.90% (2) and 39.83% (3). Their aggregation-induced behaviors were explored by the study of photoluminescence spectroscopy. The results showed that luminogens 1–3 exhibited remarkable aggregation-induced emission effect. Furthermore, their distinct mechanical stimulus-responsive fluorescence characteristics were also surveyed by solid-state photoluminescence spectroscopy. Interestingly, the various emitting colors of these luminogens could be changed into the same green, and the repeatabilities of their mechanochromic luminescence behaviors were outstanding, and the powder X-ray diffraction results indicated that the reversible conversion from a crystalline to an amorphous state was responsible for the obvious mechanofluorochromism phenomena of compounds 1–3. This work will be valuable for the exploitation of mechanical-force sensors with typical aggregation-induced emission feature.