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Near-Infrared Photoluminescence And Electrochemiluminescence From An Exceptionally Simple Boron Difluoride Formazanate Dye, Ryan R. Maar, Ruizhong Zhang, David G. Stephens, Zhifeng Ding, Joe Gilroy

Chemistry Publications

Electrochemiluminescence involves the generation of light via electrochemical reactions and has recently shown utility for single-cell imaging. To further develop this novel imaging platform, it is necessary to produce readily available dyes that photoluminesce and electrochemiluminesce in the near-infrared region to limit absorption by biological tissue. To address this need, we prepared a boron difluoride formazanate dye that exhibits near-infrared photoluminescence and electrochemiluminescence in two straightforward synthetic steps. Examination of its solid-state structure suggests that the N-aryl substituents have significant quinoidal character, which narrows the S₁-S₀ energy gap and leads to near-infrared absorption and photoluminescence. Electrochemical …