Discotic liquid crystals of transition metal complexes 50: spiranthes-like supramolecular structure of phthalocyanine-fullerene dyads

Abstract

We have synthesized novel liquid crystalline Pc - C 60 dyads (CnS)6PcCu-C60 (n = 14, 16, 18: 1a–1c) by using our developed synthetic method in order to investigate the mesomorphism and alignment behavior. Each of the (CnS)6PcCu-C60 dyads shows perfect homeotropic alignment in the Colho mesophase between two glass plates for n = 14, 16, 18 and also on a glass plate for n = 14, although none of the parent Pc compounds (CnS)8PcCu and the Pc precursors (CnS)6PcCu-OH and (CnS)6PcCu-OFBA shows homeotropic alignment. It may be attributed to the strong affinity between fullerene and glass surface. Although the reason is not so clear at the present time, this is very useful guideline for the molecular design to prepare homeotropic alignment-showing discotic liquid crystals. Very interestingly, the spherical C 60 parts form a helical structure around the column formed by the disk-like Pc parts This supramolecular structure very resembles spiranthes. The spiranthes-like supramolecular structure is compatible with one-dimensional nano-array expecting the high conversion efficiency of solar cells.