Synthesis and properties of a star-shaped organic material with triphenylamine and N-vinyl carbazole units

A starburst triphenylamine cored N-vinyl carbazole (V-Cz) branched compound was designed and synthesized via optimized Heck reaction in a yield of 40–60%. Moderate yield came from decomposition of V-Cz and self-coupling of triiodo-triphenylamine. TCz-TPA adopts a highly twisted propeller conformation by molecular mechanical optimization. It is readily soluble for its highly twisted conformation. Transparent and pinhole free films could be easily fabricated by spin-coating for its starburst structure. It emits blue-greenish light in CH 2Cl 2 peaked at 460 nm with a narrow full-width at half-maximum (FWHM) of 65 nm. As compared, the absorption peaks of the spin-coated film blue shifted and emission peak red shifted to 510 nm with a FWHM of 96 nm.