Confinement enhanced phosphorescent electrochemiluminescence of copper iodide cluster complex for imaging detection of organophosphorus pesticide.

Authors

Mengjiao Li, Yanmei Liu, Yuan Li, Guijun Li, Si Zhang, Weiwei Chen, Huangxian Ju

Published in

Mikrochimica acta. Volume 193. Issue 11. Oct 16, 2026. Epub Oct 16, 2026.

Abstract

Owing to the spin statistics of electrogenerated excitons, conventional fluorescent ECL materials fail to utilize 75% of the triplet excitons. To improve the utilization efficiency of triplet excitons, this work proposed a strategy for the design of phosphorescent ECL material based on the synergistic effect of heavy-atom iodine enhanced spin-orbit coupling (SOC) and rigid molecular environment. A copper-iodide cluster complex Cu₄I₆(pr-ted)₂ was successfully synthesized using 1-propyl-1,4-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octanium (pr-ted) as the organic cation and polyvinylpyrrolidone for chain entanglement. The enhanced SOC promoted efficient intersystem crossing, and thus rapidly populated long-lived triplet excited states, which lifted the spin-forbidden transition from the triplet state to the ground state for efficient radiative utilization of triplet excitons. The rigid network could effectively suppress non-radiative transitions and mitigate dynamic oxygen quenching. The ECL process of designed Cu₄I₆(pr-ted)₂ followed a new cluster-centered charge transfer mechanism with low non-radiative losses, exhibiting a long luminescence lifetime, high quantum yield, and an excellent ECL efficiency of 33.5%. Based on the strong ECL emission of Cu₄I₆(pr-ted)₂, an ECL imaging sensor was constructed for the quantitative detection of organophosphorus pesticides with malathion as a model analyte, which achieved a linear detection range of 10^- 3 - 10³ pg/mL and a detection limit as low as 7.68 × 10^- 4 pg/mL. This work provided a new approach for the development of efficient and low-cost phosphorescent ECL materials as well as their biosensing applications.

PMID:
42886384
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 17 Oct 2026.

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