Group 8 Organometallic Photochromic Compounds: Strategies and Applications

Stimuli-responsive photochromic units have emerged as one of the key components in the development of multi-responsive switches, optoelectronics, biomedical sciences and many more. The photoswitchability of such compounds depends greatly on the molecular structure, where association of metallic species is found to produce fascinating results. This review is a comprehensive report of all such photoswitchable metal-bounded molecules with group 8 metals within a span of last six years (2018-2024). Apart from the regular photoswitching phenomenon, this review focusses on the enhanced tunability, structural flexibility and perturbation in the photophysical properties of the Group 8 metal-based photoswitches. Previous reviews in this field have either focused on some specific applications or have been general with the type of metal incorporations. Herein, we have constructed the review with group 8 organometallic photochromic compounds that possess a wide range of real-life applications. Designing strategies, structure-property relationships and application-oriented approach of the photochromic organometallic compounds have been elucidated categorically for building up a comprehensive idea about this modern developing field of research.