Photochromic, kinetic and application for optical recording of a new diarylthene bearing pyrrole unit

A new photochromic diarylethene bearing thiophene and pyrrole unit 1-(2-cyano-1,5-dimethyl-4-pyrrole)-2-(2-butyl-5-(1,3-dioxolan-2-yl)thiophen-3-yl)perfluorocyclopentene (1o), was synthesized and its photochromic, kinetic and fluorescence properties were investigated in detail. This compound exhibited good photochromism, changing the color from colorless to blue upon irradiation with 297 nm UV light. The kinetic experiments suggested that the cyclization/cycloreversion process of the compound was determined to be the zeroth/first reaction in hexane, and the fluorescence intensity decreased along with the photochromism. Finally, using diarylethene 1c as recording medium, polarization optical recording was carried out successfully.