Photoswitchable functions

Properties which change concomitantly with diarylethene derivative photoisomerization are geometrical structures, electronic structures, refractive indices, and chiral properties (when the molecules have chiral substituents). Table 1 shows how the above property changes are applied to various photoswitching molecular systems. Details of these photoswitching functions are described in Sections 2.3 to 2.6. 

The great merit of thermal irreversibility is the permanent nature of the states. Therefore, fulgides have long been viewed as potential candidates for photon-mode optical recording materials. In addition, fulgides have been used as prototypes to demonstrate their potential applicability as photoswitchable functional materials. Those switch models that had appeared up until the end of 1999 are described in this chapter. 

The selected examples in this chapter demonstrate the success of the development of photoswitchable molecular materials through the rational designs based on the coupling of photochromic moieties into molecules with different functions, such as luminescence, nonlinear optics, liquid crystal, molecular machine, receptor, electrical con-ductor/semiconductor, and many others. It is important to emphasize that photoswitchable materials are not confined only to the selected areas in these examples. With the understanding of both the photoswitching processes and the functional properties at the molecular levels, materials that possess different varieties of photoswitchable functional properties can be readily designed and synthesized. 

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