Distance dependence of electronic energy transfer between donor and acceptor adlayers: p-terphenyl and 9,10-diphenylanthracene

Abstract

Investigations of energy transfer between adlayers on single-crystal surfaces provide a unique opportunity to explore electronic energy transfer in restricted geometries. In this study, laser induced fluorescence techniques and donor quantum yield measurements were used to examine the distance dependence of electronic energy transfer between donor and acceptor adlayers on Al2O3(0001). The donor adlayer was p-terphenyl, the acceptor adlayer was 9,10-diphenylanthracene, and n-butane was the variable spacer adlayer. The electronic energy transfer rates vs spacer thickness were determined at both 30 and 85 K in ultra high vacuum. The butane spacer experiments showed that the donor energy transfer rate decreased with a 1/d3 dependence, where d is the thickness of the spacer adlayer. Given a Förster quantum mechanical or a Kuhn classical energy transfer mechanism with randomly oriented dipoles, a 1/d3 distance dependence is consistent with resonance electronic energy transfer from a two-dimensional donor adlayer to a three-dimensional array of acceptors. The spacer measurements yielded a critical transfer distance of d0=44 ±4 Å at 30 K and d0=33 ±6 Å at 85 K. The differences in the critical transfer distance at 30 and 85 K could be explained by the redshift in the p-terphenyl fluorescence spectrum at 85 K that reduces the overlap between the donor fluorescence and acceptor absorption spectra. Values of d0=44 Å at 30 K and d0=35 Å at 85 K were calculated theoretically from a 1/d3 analysis and were in excellent agreement with the experimental measurements. The rate of donor–donor intralayer energy migration was also determined by measuring the electronic energy transfer rate versus donor coverage on the acceptor adlayer. The donor quantum yield measurements versus donor adlayer coverage were consistent with the spacer results and indicated that electronic energy migration does not occur within the p-terphenyl adlayer. These results vs spacer thickness and donor coverage reveal that electronic energy transfer in spatially confined geometries can be described using a modified Kuhn energy transfer mechanism.