Preparation of a luminescent zinc(II) coordination polymer and its encapsulation in the nanoporous channels

Metal-organic coordination polymers have attracted an increasing level of research attention in the scientific community, while the study of these materials in a confined space could also help industrial engineers to anticipate new properties. A novel 1D luminescent zinc(II) coordination polymer {[Zn(μ-dca)(4,4′-azpy)2(H2O)2]ClO4}n (1, dca = dicyanamide; 4,4′-azpy = trans-4,4′-azobis(pyridine)) has been synthesized and subsequently encapsulated in the nanoporous material MCM-41 in this work. For confined 1, the bathochromic shift of the 0–0 transitions has been correlated with the reduced HOMO–LUMO band gap accompanying with the increased energies of the frontier molecular orbitals.