The Nephelauxetic Effect Becomes an Important Design Factor for Photoactive First-Row Transition Metal Complexes

The expansion of d-orbitals as a result of metal-ligand bond covalence, the so-called nephelauxetic effect, is a well-established concept of coordination chemistry, yet its importance for the design of new photoactive complexes based on first-row transition metals is only beginning to be recognized. Until recently, much focus has been on optimizing the ligand field strength, coordination geometries, and molecular rigidity, but now it becomes evident that the nephelauxetic effect can be a game changer regarding the photophysical properties of 3d metal complexes in solution at room temperature. In Cr^III and Mn^IV complexes with the d³ valence electron configuration, the nephelauxetic effect was exploited to shift the well-known ruby-like red luminescence to the near-infrared spectral region. In Fe^II and Co^III complexes with the low-spin d⁶ electron configuration, charge-transfer excited states were stabilized with respect to detrimental metal-centered excited states, to improve their properties and to enhance their application potential. In isoelectronic (3d⁶) isocyanide complexes of Cr⁰ and Mn^I, the nephelauxetic effect is likely at play as well, enabling luminescence and other favorable photoreactivity. This minireview illustrates the broad applicability of the nephelauxetic effect in tailoring the photophysical and photochemical properties of new coordination compounds made from abundant first-row transition metals.     

Three-component entanglements consisting of three crescent-shaped bidentate ligands coordinated to an octahedral metal centre

3,3'-biisoquinoline ligands (biiq) L, bearing aromatic substituents on their 8 and 8' positions, have been used to generate interwoven systems consisting of three crescent-shaped ligands disposed around an octahedral metal centre. Mono-ligand complexes of the type [ReL(CO)3py]+ (py: pyridine) have also been prepared, leading to sterically non-hindering complexes in spite of the endotopic nature of the chelate used. The three-component entanglements have been prepared by using either FeII or RuII as gathering metal centre. The synthetic procedure is simple and efficient, affording fully characterised complexes as their PF6 or SbCl6 salts. X-ray crystallography clearly shows that the crescent-shaped ligands do not repel each other in the tris-chelate complexes. In an analogous way, the ReI complexes show open structures with no steric repulsion between the L ligand and the ancillary CO or py groups. The FeL3 or RuL3 compounds are very unusual in the sense that, contrary to all the other tris-bidentate chelate complexes made till now, the three organic components are tangled up, in a situation which will be very favourable to the formation of new non trivial topologies of the catenane type.     

Glycosylidene Carbenes,Part 29 , Insertion into B−C and Al−C Bonds: Glycosylborinates, ‐boranes,and ‐alanes

Insertion of the glycosylidene carbenes derived from the diazirines 1 , 14 , and 15 into the B−alkyl bond of the B‐alkyl‐9‐oxa‐10‐borabicyclo[3.3.2]decanes 5 , 6 , and 7 yielded the stable glycosylborinates 8 / 9 (55%, 55 : 45), 10 / 11 (31%, 65 : 35), 12 / 13 (47%, 60 : 40), 16 / 17 (55%, 55 : 45), 18 / 19 (47%, 45 : 55), and 20 / 21 (31%, 30 : 70). Crystal‐structure analysis of 17 and NOEs of 9 and 19 show that 17 , 9 , and 19 adopt similar conformations. The glycosylborinates are stable under acidic, basic and thermal conditions. The unprotected glycosylborinate 25 was obtained in 80% by hydrogenolysis of 12 . Insertion of the glycosylidene carbene derived from the diazirine 1 into a B−C bond of BEt₃, BBu₃, and BPh₃ led to unstable glycosylboranes that were oxidised to yield the hemiacetals 29 (55%), 31 (45%), and 33 (48%), respectively, besides the glucals 30 (13%), 32 (20%), and 34 (20%), respectively. Insertion of the glycosylidene carbenes derived from 14 and 15 into a B−C bond of BEt₃ led exclusively to hemiacetals; only 15 yielding traces of the glucal 40 besides the hemiacetal 39 . The glycosylidene carbene derived from 1 reacted with Al(ⁱBu)₃ and AlMe₃ to generate reactive glycosylalanes that were hydrolysed, yielding the C‐glycosides 46 (21%) and 49 (30%), respectively, besides the glucals 48 (26%) and 51 (30%); deuteriolysis instead of protonolysis led to the monodeuterio analogues of 46 and 49 , respectively, which possess an equatorial ²H‐atom at the anomeric center.     

Growth and Characterization of CdAl2S4 and CdAl2Se4 Single Crystals

Single crystals of CdAl₂S₄ and CdAl₂Se₄ showing high transparency were grown by the chemical vapour transport method. Their composition was proven by microprobe analysis. Structural investigations were done by Rietveld refinements and are in good agreement with known structure data. From transmittance and reflectance measurements the energy of the band gap WBS estimated. Assuming a direct nature of the corresponding optical transition the following values were obtained: E_g = 3.82 eV (RT), E_g = 3.94 eV (85 K) for CdAl₂S₄ and E_g = 2.95 eV (RT), E_g = 3.07 eV (85 K) for CdAl₂Se₄ respectively.     

Luminescent and Photoredox-Active Molybdenum(0) Complexes Competitive with Isoelectronic Ruthenium(II) Polypyridines

Ruthenium(II) complexes with chelating polypyridine ligands are among the most frequently investigated compounds in photophysics and photochemistry, owing to their favorable luminescence and photoredox properties. Equally good photoluminescence performance and attractive photocatalytic behavior is now achievable with isoelectronic molybdenum(0) complexes. The zero-valent oxidation state of molybdenum is stabilized by carbonyl or isocyanide ligands, and metal-to-ligand charge transfer (MLCT) excited states analogous to those in ruthenium(II) complexes can be established. Microsecond MLCT excited-state lifetimes and photoluminescence quantum yields up to 0.2 have been achieved in solution at room temperature, and the emission wavelength has become tunable over a large range. The molybdenum(0) complexes are stronger photoreductants than ruthenium(II) polypyridines and can therefore perform more challenging chemical reductions. The triplet nature of their luminescent MLCT states allows sensitization of photon upconversion via triplet-triplet annihilation, to convert low-energy input radiation into higher-energy output fluorescence. This review summarizes the current state of the art concerning luminescent molybdenum(0) complexes and highlights their application potential. Molybdenum is roughly 140 times more abundant and far cheaper than ruthenium, hence this research is relevant in the greater context of finding more sustainable alternatives to using precious and rare transition metals in photophysics and photochemistry.     

Top-down proteomics reveals novel protein forms expressed in methanosarcina acetivorans

Combining our previous work with current platforms presented here that identified 99 new proteins (Supplemental Table 1), a total of 200 protein identities in M. acetivorans have been confirmed. Of these, five proteins were unannotated, 15 were mispredicted, two exhibited variable removal of the start methionine, and one was a proteolysis fragment from the identical C-terminus of two possible proteins. The incorporation of LC-MS/MS and offline automation speeds up the processing of samples through automation of the top-down process. For five data files that were automatically processed and iteratively searched, 2 h were required to complete analysis. In these, a total of 835 identifications were detected by the search algorithm in this time period. The expanded use of top-down will use both online and offline strategies, with increasingly sophisticated data acquisition strategies tailored for the challenges of top-down fragmentation [[16], [18], [19], [32] and [33]].     

Post-acquisition ETD spectral processing for increased peptide identifications

Tandem mass spectra (MS/MS) produced using electron transfer dissociation (ETD) differ from those derived from collision-activated dissociation (CAD) in several important ways. Foremost, the predominant fragment ion series are different: c- and z ^·-type ions are favored in ETD spectra while b- and y-type ions comprise the bulk of the fragments in CAD spectra. Additionally, ETD spectra possess charge-reduced precursors and unique neutral losses. Most database search algorithms were designed to analyze CAD spectra, and have only recently been adapted to accommodate c- and z ^·-type ions; therefore, inclusion of these additional spectral features can hinder identification, leading to lower confidence scores and decreased sensitivity. Because of this, it is important to pre-process spectral data before submission to a database search to remove those features that cause complications. Here, we demonstrate the effects of removing these features on the number of unique peptide identifications at a 1% false discovery rate (FDR) using the open mass spectrometry search algorithm (OMSSA). When analyzing two biologic replicates of a yeast protein extract in three total analyses, the number of unique identifications with a ∼1% FDR increased from 4611 to 5931 upon spectral pre-processing—an increase of ∼28. 6%. We outline the most effective pre-processing methods, and provide free software containing these algorithms.     

Cover Picture: Tuning the Rates of Long‐Range Charge Transfer across Phenylene Wires (ChemPhysChem 8/2009)

The central part of the cover picture shows that the rates for long‐range charge transfer across covalent phenylene bridges can be very sensitive to the chemical substituents attached to the individual bridging units. The peripheral parts of the picture illustrate the flash–quench technique employed to investigate intramolecular charge transfer between a phenothiazine donor and a photochemically generated ruthenium(III) complex. On page 1203 , M. E. Walther and O. S. Wenger explain their experimental findings in terms of donor‐bridge energy matching for hole transfer.

     

High molar extinction coefficient heteroleptic ruthenium complexes for thin film dye-sensitized solar cells

Two novel heteroleptic sensitizers, Ru((4,4-dicarboxylic acid-2,2'-bipyridine)(4,4'-bis(p-hexyloxystyryl)-2,2-bipyridine)(NCS)2 and Ru((4,4-dicarboxylic acid-2,2'-bipyridine)(4,4'-bis(p-methoxystyryl)-2,2'-bipyridine) (NCS)2, coded as K-19 and K-73, respectively, have been synthesized and characterized by 1H NMR, FTIR, UV-vis absorption, and emission spectroscopy and excited-state lifetime and spectroelectrochemical measurements. The introduction of the alkoxystyryl group extends the conjugation of the bipyridine donor ligand increasing markedly their molar extinction coefficient and solar light harvesting capacity. The dynamics of photoinduced charge separation following electronic excitation of the K-19 dye was scrutinized by time-resolved laser spectroscopy. The electron transfer from K-19 to the conduction band of TiO2 is completed within 20 fs while charge recombination has a half-life time of 800 s. The high extinction coefficients of these sensitizers enable realization of a new generation of a thin film dye sensitized solar cell (DSC) yielding high conversion efficiency at full sunlight even with viscous electrolytes based on ionic liquids or nonvolatile solvents. An unprecedented yield of over 9% was obtained under standard reporting conditions (simulated global air mass 1.5 sunlight at 1000 W/m2 intensity) when the K-73 sensitizer was combined with a nonvolatile "robust" electrolyte. The K-19 dye gave a conversion yield of 7.1% when used in conjunction with the binary ionic liquid electrolyte. These devices exhibit excellent stability under light soaking at 60 degrees C. The effect of the mesoscopic TiO2 film thickness on photovoltaic performance has been analyzed by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS).     

FEM simulation of Rayleigh waves for CMOS compatible SAW devices based on AlN/SiO2/Si(1 0 0)

A simulation study of Rayleigh wave devices based on a stacked AlN/SiO₂/Si(1 0 0) device was carried out. Dispersion curves with respect to acoustic phase velocity, reflectivity and electromechanical coupling efficiency for tungsten W and aluminium Al electrodes and different layer thicknesses were quantified by 2D FEM COMSOL simulations. Simulated acoustic mode shapes are presented. The impact of these parameters on the observed Rayleigh wave modes was discussed. High coupling factors of 2% and high velocities up to 5000 m/s were obtained by optimizing the AlN/SiO₂ thickness ratio.