Light-Harvesting Supramolecular Phosphors: Highly Efficient Room Temperature Phosphorescence in Solution and Hydrogels.

Solution phase room-temperature phosphorescence (RTP) from organic phosphors is seldom realized. Herein we report one of the highest quantum yield solution state RTP (ca. 41.8 %) in water, from a structurally simple phthalimide phosphor, by employing an organic-inorganic supramolecular scaffolding strategy. We further use these supramolecular hybrid phosphors as a light-harvesting scaffold to achieve delayed fluorescence from orthogonally anchored Sulforhodamine acceptor dyes via an efficient triplet to singlet Förster resonance energy transfer (TS-FRET), which is rarely achieved in solution. Electrostatic cross-linking of the inorganic scaffold at higher concentrations further facilitates the formation of self-standing hydrogels with efficient RTP and energy-transfer mediated long-lived fluorescence.