Aqueous phase and amorphous state room temperature phosphorescence from a small aromatic carbonyl derivative

Harvesting triplet excitons via room temperature phosphorescence (RTP) in solution or amorphous state from purely organic chromophores is a formidable challenge. Supramolecular hybrid co-assembly between a brominated aromatic carbonyl derivative (BrPhS) and laponite clay (LP) particles is shown to result in remarkable triplet stabilization to result room temperature phosphorescence (RTP) in aqueous solution as well as in amorphous thin films. This remarkable feature is realized by means of highly organized, rigid molecular network of the dye molecules on the inorganic scaffold which reduces the vibrational dissipations as well as limits the oxygen diffusion to facilitate the triplet harvesting under ambient conditions. The water soluble phosphor, BrPhS is also shown to be an excellent triplet emitter in other amorphous polymer matrices like polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and sodium polystyrene sulphonate (PSS) with phosphorescence quantum yield over 30% in air.