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Article
Title Highly luminescent scintillating hetero-ligand MOF nanocrystals with engineered Stokes shift for photonic applications
Author(s) Perego, J (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Bezuidenhout, Charl X (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Villa, I (CTU, Prague) ; Cova, F (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Crapanzano, R (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Frank, I (CERN ; LMU Munich (main)) ; Pagano, F (CERN ; Milan Bicocca U.) ; Kratochwill, N (CERN ; Vienna U.) ; Auffray, E (CERN) ; Bracco, S (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Vedda, A (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Dujardin, C (U. Lyon 1, IUT) ; Sozzani, P E (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Meinardi, F (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Comotti, A (Milan Bicocca U.) ; Monguzzi, A (Milan Bicocca U.)
Publication 2022
Number of pages 10
In: Nature Commun. 13 (2022) 3504
DOI 10.1038/s41467-022-31163-0
Subject category Physics in General
Abstract Large Stokes shift fast emitters show a negligible reabsorption of their luminescence, a feature highly desirable for several applications such as fluorescence imaging, solar-light managing, and fabricating sensitive scintillating detectors for medical imaging and high-rate high-energy physics experiments. Here we obtain high efficiency luminescence with significant Stokes shift by exploiting fluorescent conjugated acene building blocks arranged in nanocrystals. Two ligands of equal molecular length and connectivity, yet complementary electronic properties, are co-assembled by zirconium oxy-hydroxy clusters, generating crystalline hetero-ligand metal-organic framework (MOF) nanocrystals. The diffusion of singlet excitons within the MOF and the matching of ligands absorption and emission properties enables an ultrafast activation of the low energy emission in the 100 ps time scale. The hybrid nanocrystals show a fluorescence quantum efficiency of  60% and a Stokes shift as large as 750 meV ( 6000 cm$^{−1}$), which suppresses the emission reabsorption also in bulk devices. The fabricated prototypal nanocomposite fast scintillator shows benchmark performances which compete with those of some inorganic and organic commercial systems.
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 Journalen skapades 2022-07-05, och modifierades senast 2023-03-31


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