Improving Quantum Efficiencies of Siloles and Silole‐Derived Butadiene Chromophores through Structural Tuning

A brighter future for siloles. Luminescent silole chromophores with the highest quantum efficiencies reported for a fully substituted monomeric silole are generated by altering the steric properties of the substituent groups. Treatment of 1,1-dimethylsiloles with Bu4NF (TBAF) in THF rapidly gives stereospecific desilylation at room temperature (see scheme). Intense solid-state photoluminescence is observed in thin films of the silole fluorophores.