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The concentration-dependent absorption and temperature-dependent fluorescence of the perylene bisimide dye PBI 1 in methylcyclohexane point to a biphasic aggregation behavior. At intermediate concentrations and temperatures, respectively, a dimer with low fluorescence yield dominates, which cannot be extended to longer aggregates. Those are formed at high concentrations and low temperatures, respectively, via a second, energetically unfavorable dimer species that acts as a nucleus. A corresponding aggregation model reproduces accurately the concentration dependence and allows extracting the equilibrium constants and spectra of the distinct species. The differences in the photophysical properties indicate H-type excitonic coupling for the favored dimer and J-type characteristics for the extended aggregates which could be related to structural models based on DFT calculations. The energetics can be understood by considering hydrogen-bonding and π-π-stacking interactions.
Fennel et al. (Mon,) studied this question.