• Chinese Optics Letters
  • Vol. 23, Issue 2, 021601 (2025)
Kezhou Chen1,2, Xiangyu Meng1,2, Qingxin Luan1,2, Bo Albinsson3,**..., Lili Hou1,2,3,* and Tiegen Liu1,2,***|Show fewer author(s)
Author Affiliations
  • 1School of Precision Instrument and Opto-electronics Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
  • 2Key Laboratory of Opto-electronics Information Technology, Tianjin University, Tianjin 300072, China
  • 3Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg 41296, Sweden
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    DOI: 10.3788/COL202523.021601 Cite this Article Set citation alerts
    Kezhou Chen, Xiangyu Meng, Qingxin Luan, Bo Albinsson, Lili Hou, Tiegen Liu, "Optical modulation of photoluminescence in carbon quantum dots using diarylethene molecular photoswitches [Invited]," Chin. Opt. Lett. 23, 021601 (2025) Copy Citation Text show less

    Abstract

    Modulating photoluminescent (PL) materials is crucial for applications such as super-resolution microscopy. The combination of PL materials and photoswitches can achieve this aim by utilizing isomerization of the photoswitches. Here we report an optically PL switchable system by mixing carbon quantum dots (CQDs) and diarylethene (DAE) molecular photoswitches. The PL on/off states of CQDs, switched with alternating visible and UV light, achieve a PL on/off ratio of ∼500 and stable reversibility over 20 cycles. The mechanism of our design is revealed by PL lifetime measurements, temperature-dependent PL spectroscopy, and density functional theory (DFT) calculations, confirming that efficient static quenching and the inner filter effect between CQDs and closed DAEs are the keys to achieving such outstanding performance.
    ϕ=ϕrIIrArA,

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    Edyn=1τ/τ0,

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    EIF=1II0=110(A57022),

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    I0I=1+τ0kq[Q],

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    Kezhou Chen, Xiangyu Meng, Qingxin Luan, Bo Albinsson, Lili Hou, Tiegen Liu, "Optical modulation of photoluminescence in carbon quantum dots using diarylethene molecular photoswitches [Invited]," Chin. Opt. Lett. 23, 021601 (2025)
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