PPS Blog

The latest issue of PPS is now available online!

The front cover of this issue features work by Falk Renth, Friedrich Temps and colleagues from the University of Kiel, Germany, who report the sequential photoisomerisation dynamics of the push-pull azobenzene Disperse Red 1.  Azobenzene forms the basis of a number of numerous derivatives with applications as photochromic switches, tiny light-driven molecular manipulators, actuators and engines, and small optical memory or logical devices.  However, to reach the ambitious applications and designs for optimised functional azobenzene devices, we need to have detailed knowledge of the molecular dynamics of these molecules under different conditions. 

Here the team looked at substituted azobenzene dye Dispersed Red 1 (DR1), which is an electron donor-electron acceptor dye and a so-called push-pull azobenzene.  The donor-acceptor substitution introduces a strong charge-transfer character to the ππ* electronic transition.  The authors studied the ultra-fast dynamics of this push-pull character after photoexcitation at λ_pump= 475 nm by femtosecond time-resolved transient absorption spectroscopy and fluorescence up-conversion spectroscopy. This study of the DR1 dye in solution has provided a basis for the interpretation of new experiments on the photodynamics of DR1 in complex environments and under application-relevant conditions.

This article is free to access for 6 weeks!  Click on the link below to find out more…

Sequential photoisomerisation dynamics of the push–pull azobenzene Disperse Red 1, Julia Bahrenburg, Katharina Röttger, Ron Siewertsen, Falk Renth and Friedrich Temps, Photochem. Photobiol. Sci., 2012, 11, 1210-1219 DOI: 10.1039/C2PP05400K

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