Controlled Orientations of Neighboring Tetracene Units by Mixed Self-Assembled Monolayers on Gold Nanoclusters for High-Yield and Long-Lived Triplet Excited States through Singlet Fission

Although tetracene (Tc) is well-known as a good candidate for singlet fission (SF), the number of high-yield and long-lived triplet excited states through SF is extremely limited because of the relative acceleration of the reverse triplet-triplet annihilation (TTA) considering the energy matching between a singlet and two triplet states. Systematic control of electronic interactions between two neighboring units using conventional covalent linkages and molecular assembly methods to optimize these kinetic processes is quite difficult because of the complicated synthesis and random orientations. In this study, we propose a novel supramolecular strategy utilizing mixed self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) with two different chain lengths. Specifically, mixed Tc-SAMs on gold nanoclusters, which are prepared using Tc-modified heterodisulfides with two different chain lengths, attain high-yield SF (ΦSF ≈ 90%) and individual triplet yields (ΦΤ ≈ 160%). The obtained ΦSF is the highest value among Tc derivatives in homogeneous solution to the best of our knowledge.