White Light Generation from a Self-Assembled Fluorogen–Surfactant Composite Light Harvesting Platform

Nonionic surfactant modulated aggregation induced emission enhancement (AIEE) of Dimethyl-2,5-bis(4-(methoxyphenyl)amino)terephthalate (DBMPT) has been investigated. DBMPT exhibits unidirectional aggregated growth with nonionic triton X-100 (TX-100) to produce highly luminescent nanorods, the dimensions and emission intensities of which are controlled by concentration of DBMPT. Energy transfer from perylene-3,4,9,10-tetracarboxylic acid dianhydride (PTAD) to these nanorods in aqueous medium produces pure white light emission with the CIE chromaticity coordinates (0.33, 0.36) and a significantly high quantum yield of 35%. Gelation of the system with agarose yields a bright white light emitting gel. Both these factors demonstrate an excellent potential for application of this system in light harvesting and as an advanced material for organic electronic devices.