Energy materials based on metal Schiff base complexes

Metal Schiff base complexes represent a class of compounds that have become a field of immense interest because of their intriguing chemical and physical properties, and their wide-ranging applications in a number of scientific areas. The presence of transition metal elements with a polydentate Schiff base ligand to form metal complexes offers a good platform for combining the chemical, electronic, magnetic, optical and redox properties of metal complexes with those of the organic materials. Metal Schiff base complexes can be incorporated into discrete small molecules, oligomers or polymers, generating new functional materials with useful mechanical, catalytic, thermal, chemical and optoelectronic properties. This review presents the contemporary research development of the field, with emphasis on the fundamental concepts, facile tuning of the photophysical properties and possible energy-related applications of various functional metal Schiff base complexes. To date, many soluble conjugated materials based on metal Schiff base complexes have been generated and studied. They have found an array of energy applications, for example, as converters for light/electricity signals in organic light-emitting diodes and dye-sensitized solar cells, energy storage and potential conductive thermoelectric materials.