A new way to construct luminescent functionalized silicon hybrid material derived from methyldichlorosilane

The functional precursor (PySi) was derived from the hydrosilylation reaction of methyldichlorosilane and 4-vinylpyridine, and then two series of novel luminescent hybrid materials (RE-PySi, where RE = Tb, Dy) with organic fragments covalently linked to inorganic parts were assembled by a sol–gel process, and characterized by the X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, and spectroscopy. It is found that the sol–gel treatment has an influence on the organization and microstructure of the hybrid materials, indicating that the hybrid material systems derived from different solvents exhibit different textures. The photoluminescent behavior of these chemically bonded hybrids was studied in detail. The observed green luminescence suggested that the intra-molecular energy-transfer process between the lanthanide ion and the pyridyl group takes place among these molecular-based hybrids.