<p>Processes where a molecule absorbs visible light and then disposes of the excess energy via electron/energy transfer reactions have an important role both in nature (e.g. in photosynthesis) and in many technical applications (e.g. in photography and photovoltaics). This thesis uses different spectroscopical techniques, mainly ultrafast transient absorption, to study such processes. The thesis can roughly be divided into three parts.</p><p>In the first part, donor-acceptor systems linked by different conjugated bridges are studied. The objective was to see to what extent the conjugated link could enhance excited state energy or electron transfer, via so-called superexchange processes. The studied links do enhance the electron/energy transfer but in the electron transfer study the resulting charge separated state was very short lived.</p><p>The second part explores the possibility of constructing acceptor-donor-acceptor triads where the direction of electron transfer is determined by the electronic state of the donor. Direct evidence of electron transfer in the form of radical absorption was found from both the first and the second excited states of the donor.</p><p>In the last part, two common chromophores were investigated by transient absorption anisotropy. In the case of Ru(bpy)₃²⁺, it was found that the complex lost all memory of the polarization of the exciting light much faster than what was previously thought. This means that electron transfer between ligands is normally not the rate limiting step in electron transfer reactions involving this complex. In the case of zinc porphyrin, it was seen that the measured anisotropy differed depending on which electronic state was excited suggesting differences in the degree of coherence.</p>

<p>A molecular system capable of photoinduced water splitting is an attractive approach to solar energy conversion. This thesis deals with the functional characterization of molecular building blocks for the three principal functions of such a molecular system: Photoinduced accumulative charge separation, catalytic water oxidation, and catalytic proton reduction. </p><p>Systems combining a ruthenium-trisbipyridine photosensitizer with multi-electron donors in form of dinuclear ruthenium or manganese complexes were investigated in view of the rate constants of electron transfer and excited state quenching. The kinetics were studied in the different oxidation states of the donor unit by combination of electrochemistry and time resolved spectroscopy. The rapid excited state quenching by the multi-electron donors points to the importance of redox intermediates for efficient accumulative photooxidation of the terminal donor.</p><p>The redox behavior of manganese complexes as mimics of the water oxidizing catalyst in the natural photosynthetic reaction center was studied by electrochemical and spectroscopic methods. For a dinuclear manganese complex ligand exchange reactions were studied in view of their importance for the accumulative oxidation of the complex and its reactivity towards water. With the binding of substrate water, multiple oxidation in a narrow potential range and concomitant deprotonation of the bound water it was demonstrated that the manganese complex is capable of mimicking multiple aspects of photosynthetic water oxidation.</p><p>A dinuclear iron complex was investigated as biomimetic proton reduction catalyst. The complex structurally mimics the active site of the iron-only hydrogenase enzyme and was designed to hold a proton on the bridging ligand and a hydride on the iron centers. Thermodynamics and kinetics of the protonation reactions and the electrochemical behavior of the different protonation states were studied in view of their potential catalytic performance.</p>

This thesis describes an interdisciplinary project, where the aim is to mimic the initial reactions in photosynthesis. In photosynthesis, the absorption of light is followed by the formation of charge-separated states. The energy stored in these charge-separated states is further used for the oxidation of water and reduction of carbon dioxide. In this thesis the photo-induced processes in a range of supramolecular complexes have been investigated with time resolved spectroscopic techniques. The complexes studied consist of three types of units; photosensitizers (P) capable of absorbing light, electron acceptors (A) that are easily reduced and electron donors (D) that are easily oxidised. Our results are important for the future design of artificial photosystems, where the goal is to produce hydrogen from light and water. Two molecular triads with a D-P-A architecture are presented. In the first one, a photo-induced charge-separated state was formed in an unusually high yield (φ&gt;90%). In the second triad, photo-irradiation led to the formation of an extremely long-lived charge-separated state (τ = 500 ms at 140K). This is also the first synthetically made triad containing a dinuclear manganese unit as electron donor. Further, two sets of P-A dyads are presented. In both, the expected photo-induced reduction of the electron acceptor is diminished due to competing energy transfer to the triplet state of the acceptor. Finally, a P-P-A complex containing two separate photosensitizers is described. The idea is to produce high-energy charge-separated states by using the energy from two photons.

Processes where a molecule absorbs visible light and then disposes of the excess energy via electron/energy transfer reactions have an important role both in nature (e.g. in photosynthesis) and in many technical applications (e.g. in photography and photovoltaics). This thesis uses different spectroscopical techniques, mainly ultrafast transient absorption, to study such processes. The thesis can roughly be divided into three parts. In the first part, donor-acceptor systems linked by different conjugated bridges are studied. The objective was to see to what extent the conjugated link could enhance excited state energy or electron transfer, via so-called superexchange processes. The studied links do enhance the electron/energy transfer but in the electron transfer study the resulting charge separated state was very short lived. The second part explores the possibility of constructing acceptor-donor-acceptor triads where the direction of electron transfer is determined by the electronic state of the donor. Direct evidence of electron transfer in the form of radical absorption was found from both the first and the second excited states of the donor. In the last part, two common chromophores were investigated by transient absorption anisotropy. In the case of Ru(bpy)32+, it was found that the complex lost all memory of the polarization of the exciting light much faster than what was previously thought. This means that electron transfer between ligands is normally not the rate limiting step in electron transfer reactions involving this complex. In the case of zinc porphyrin, it was seen that the measured anisotropy differed depending on which electronic state was excited suggesting differences in the degree of coherence.

A molecular system capable of photoinduced water splitting is an attractive approach to solar energy conversion. This thesis deals with the functional characterization of molecular building blocks for the three principal functions of such a molecular system: Photoinduced accumulative charge separation, catalytic water oxidation, and catalytic proton reduction. Systems combining a ruthenium-trisbipyridine photosensitizer with multi-electron donors in form of dinuclear ruthenium or manganese complexes were investigated in view of the rate constants of electron transfer and excited state quenching. The kinetics were studied in the different oxidation states of the donor unit by combination of electrochemistry and time resolved spectroscopy. The rapid excited state quenching by the multi-electron donors points to the importance of redox intermediates for efficient accumulative photooxidation of the terminal donor. The redox behavior of manganese complexes as mimics of the water oxidizing catalyst in the natural photosynthetic reaction center was studied by electrochemical and spectroscopic methods. For a dinuclear manganese complex ligand exchange reactions were studied in view of their importance for the accumulative oxidation of the complex and its reactivity towards water. With the binding of substrate water, multiple oxidation in a narrow potential range and concomitant deprotonation of the bound water it was demonstrated that the manganese complex is capable of mimicking multiple aspects of photosynthetic water oxidation. A dinuclear iron complex was investigated as biomimetic proton reduction catalyst. The complex structurally mimics the active site of the iron-only hydrogenase enzyme and was designed to hold a proton on the bridging ligand and a hydride on the iron centers. Thermodynamics and kinetics of the protonation reactions and the electrochemical behavior of the different protonation states were studied in view of their potential catalytic performance.

Proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET) is one of the elementary reactions occurring in many chemical and biological systems, such as photosystem II where the oxidation of tyrosine (TyrZ) is coupled to deprotonation of the phenolic proton. This reaction is here modelled by the oxidation of a phenol covalently linked to a Ru(bpy)32+-moitey, which is photo-oxidized by a laser flash-quench method. This model system is unusual as mechanism of PCET is studied in a unimolecular system in water solution. Here we address the question how the nature of the proton accepting base and its hydrogen bond to phenol influence the PCET reaction. In the first part we investigate the effect of an internal hydrogen bond PCET from. Two similar phenols are compared. For both these the proton accepting base is a carboxylate group linked to the phenol on the ortho-position directly or via a methylene group. On the basis of kinetic and thermodynamic arguments it is suggested that the PCET from these occurs via a concerted electron proton transfer (CEP). Moreover, numerical modelling of the kinetic data provides an in-depth analysis of this CEP reaction, including promoting  vibrations  along the O–H–O coordinate that are required to explain the data. The second part describes the study on oxidation of phenol where either water or an external base the proton acceptor. The pH-dependence of the kinetics reveals four mechanistic regions for PCET within the same molecule when water is the base. It is shown that the competition between the mechanisms can be tuned by the strength of the oxidant. Moreover, these studies reveal the conditions that may favour a buffer-assisted PCET over that with deprotonation to water solution.

Quantum chemical calculations have been used to model dye-sensitized nanostructured titanium dioxide systems that can be used in solar cells for solar energy to electricity conversion. Structural, electronic and spectral properties of isolated dyes and both bare and dye-sensitized TiO2 have been calculated with density functional theory, providing detailed information about both the separate parts and the dye-TiO2 interface. The connection between the geometry, the ligand field splitting and the lifetime of the triplet metal-to-ligand charge transfer (MLCT) excited state has been explored for a series of ruthenium polypyridyl dyes. Moreover, the relative energetics of MLCT and metal centered triplet excited states have been studied for a number of such systems. It was found that small alterations of the polypyridyl ligands can result in significant changes in ligand field splitting and in the energetics of the triplet states. Attachment of the dyes to the TiO2 surface is achieved via anchor and spacer groups. The influence of such groups on various properties of the dye and their ability to act as mediators of photo-induced surface electron transfer has been studied. Delocalization of the lowest unoccupied dye orbital onto the spacer and/or anchor group indicates that certain unsaturated groups can mediate electron transfer. With a combination of methods that enables efficient computations and a scheme for construction of metal oxide clusters, chemical models for bare TiO2 nanocrystals in the 1-2 nm size range have been developed. The electronic structures show well-developed band structures with essentially no electronic band gap defect states. Atomistic models of the interface between TiO2 nanocrystals and Ru(II)-bis-terpyridine dyes, the so-called N3 dye as well as perylene dyes are reported. Electronic coupling strengths, which provide estimates for the electron injection times, are extracted from the interfacial electronic structure and the lowest electronic excitations are calculated.

Anthraquinone (AQ) has been used in electron transfer studies in DNA. The focus of this dissertation is the synthesis of conjugates between AQ derivatives and 2’-deoxyadenosine (dA), which can be used to induce adenine oxidation in DNA. Different AQ derivatives were attached to dA via ethynyl or ethanyl linkers. If incorporated into DNA, these short linkers should enable regiocontrol for electron transfer from adenine within the DNA duplex structure. The challenge in working with anthraquinone-2’-deoxynucleosides conjugates is that they and their intermediates are insoluble in water and only sparingly soluble in most organic solvents. A strategy used to overcome this problem was the use of either tert-butyldiphenylsilyl (TBDPS) or 4’,4-dimethoxytrityl (DMTr) 5’-protected deoxynucleosides as starting materials. A water-soluble, ethynyl-linked AQ-dA conjugate with a 3’-benzyl hydrogen phosphate was synthesized using DMTr protection. The DMTr group was not stable to the hydrogenation required to make the ethanyl-linked AQ-dA conjugate with 3’-benzyl hydrogen phosphate. Hence the latter was synthesized starting with the TBDPS protecting group. Both of these syntheses were based on the Pd coupling between ethynylanthraquinone and 8-bromodeoxyadenosine derivatives. New conjugates between AQ and A, in which the AQ moieties have been modified with formyl, trifluoroacetyl and methyl ester groups as electron withdrawing substituents were also synthesized. The synthesis of these AQ-dA conjugates was based on Pd coupling between bromoanthraquinone and 8-ethynyldeoxyadenosine derivatives. This route avoided the use of ethynylanthraquinone derivatives that had extremely low solubility and photoinstability. Other anthraquinones with electron withdrawing groups (which should provide enhanced driving force to enable respective AQ derivative to oxidize adenine) were synthesized as models. Cyclic voltammetry showed that the conjugate with the two ester groups and ethynyl linker was the most easily reduced of the derivatives synthesized. Conjugates between AQ and dU were also synthesized. Those conjugates can potentially be used to oxidize guanine or adenine or they can be used as a deep trap for an electron in reduced DNA.

Proton coupled electron transfer reactions often involve tyrosine residues, because when oxidized, the phenolic side chain deprotonates. Tyrosine Z (YZ) is responsible for extracting electrons in a stepwise fashion from the oxygen evolving-complex in order to build enough potential to oxidize water. This process requires that each step YZ must deprotonate and reprotonate in order to maintain the high midpoint potential that is necessary to oxidize the oxygen-evolving complex, which makes YZ highly involved in proton coupled electron transfer reactions. In this thesis YZ has been studied within oxygen-evolving photosystem II utilizing electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy to monitor the tyrosyl radical that is formed upon light excitation. Kinetic analysis of YZ has shed light on the factors that are important for PSII to carry out water oxidation at the oxygen-evolving complex. Most notably the strong hydrogen-bonding network and the midpoint potential of YZ have been shown to be integral aspects of the water splitting reactions of PSII. By studying YZ within oxygen-evolving PSII, conclusions are readily applied to the native system.

The field of organic electronics, in which -conjugated, organic molecules and polymers are used as the active components (e.g., semiconductor, light emitter/harvester, etc.), has lead to a number a number of key technological developments that have been founded within fundamental research disciplines. In the Dissertation that follows, the research involves the use of quantum-chemical techniques to elucidate fundamental aspects of both intermolecular and intramolecular electron-transfer processes in organic, -conjugated molecules. The Dissertation begins with an introduction and brief review of organic molecular systems used as electron-transport semiconducting materials in device applications and/or in the fundamental studies of intramolecular mixed-valence processes. This introductory material is then followed by a brief review of the electronic-structure methods (e.g., Hartree-Fock theory and Density Functional Theory) and electron-transfer theory (i.e., semiclassical Marcus theory) employed throughout the investigations. The next three Chapters deal with investigations related to the characterization of non-rigid, -conjugated molecular systems that have amorphous solid-state properties used as the electron-transport layer in organic electronic and optoelectronic devices. Chapters 3 and 4 involve studies of silole- (silacyclopentadiene)-based materials that possess attractive electronic and optical properties in the solid state. Chapter 5 offers a preliminary study of dioxaborine-based molecular structures as electron-transport systems. In Chapters 6 8, the focus of the work shifts to investigations of organic mixed-valence systems. Chapter 6 centers on the examination of tetraanisylarylenediamine systems where the inter-redox site distances are approximately equal throughout the series. Chapter 7 examines the bridge-length dependence of the geometric structure, charge-(de)localization, and electronic coupling for a series of vinylene- and phenylene-vinylene-bridged bis-dianisylamines. In Chapter 8, the role of symmetric vibrations in the delocalization of the excess charge is studied in a dioxaborine radical-anion and a series of radical-cation bridged-bisdimethylamines. Finally, Chapter 9 provides a synopsis of the work and goals for future consideration.