TY - JOUR A1 - Kowarik, Stefan A1 - Weber, C. A1 - Pithan, L. A1 - Zykov, A. A1 - Bommel, S. A1 - Carla, F. A1 - Felici, R. A1 - Knie, C. A1 - Bléger, D. T1 - Multiple timescales in the photoswitching kinetics of crystalline thin films of azobenzene-trimers T2 - Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter N2 - Functional materials that exhibit photoinduced structural phase transitions are highly interesting for applications in optomechanics and mechanochemistry. It is, however, still not fully understood how photochemical reactions, which are often accompanied by molecular motion, proceed in confined and crystalline environments. Here we show that thin films of azobenzene trimers exhibit high structural order and determine the crystallographic unit cell. We demonstrate that thin film can be switched partially reversibly between a crystalline and an amorphous phase. The time constant of the photoinduced amorphisation as measured with real-time x-ray diffraction ($\approx $ 220 s) lies between the two time constants (120 s and 2870 s) of the ensemble photoisomerisation processes that are measured via optical spectroscopy. Our observation of a photoinduced shrinking of the crystalline domains indicates a cascading process, in which photoisomerisation starts at the surface of the thin film and propagates deeper into the crystalline layer by introducing disorder and generating free volume. This finding is important for the rapidly evolving research field of photoresponsive thin films and smart crystalline materials in general. KW - Azobenzene PY - 2017 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-bam/frontdoor/index/index/docId/42501 AN - OPUS4-42501 SN - 0953-8984 SN - 1361-648X VL - 29 IS - 43 SP - Article 434001, 1 EP - 8 AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany