Thermally controlling the intra- and intermolecular proton transfer reaction: a distinct gateway to luminescent switching

The potential of the long-neglected chemical reaction strategy for reversible luminescent switching was rediscovered. Herein, a thermally gated proton transfer reaction was innovatively developed for designing a reversible fluorochromic material, which exhibits practical applications in fluorescent switching displays and encrypted information storage. This work opens up a way to develop novel and simple thermofluorochromic devices.