EPR spectra of gable-type copper(II) porphyrin dimers in fluid solution: extraction of exchange interaction in weakly coupled doublet pairs

Supramolecular copolymerization of hydrophobic and hydrophilic monomers in liquid crystalline media

In the case of covalent polymers, immiscible polymers can be integrated by covalently linking them together, but such a strategy is not possible in supramolecular polymers. Here we report the supramolecular copolymerization of two porphyrin-based monomers, C10P2H and TEGPCu with side chains bearing cyanobiphenyl (CB) groups at the ends of hydrophobic alkyl or hydrophilic tetraethylene glycol chains, respectively. These monomers undergo self-sorting supramolecular polymerization in highly diluted solutions ([monomer] = 3.4 × 10-9 mol% (2.0 × 10-8 mol L-1)) in nonpolar media due to the incompatibility of the side chains. Surprisingly, these monomers undergo supramolecular copolymerization under high concentration conditions ([monomer] = 7.7 mol%) in the medium of 4-cyano-4'-pentyloxybiphenyl (5OCB) to form a columnar liquid crystalline phase under thermodynamic conditions, where the individual columns are composed of supramolecular block copolymers. The combination of CB ends of both monomers and the 5OCB medium is essential for the two monomers to form an integrated structure in a condensed system without phase separation.

Remarkable Enhancement of Catalytic Activity of Cu-Complexes in the Electrochemical Hydrogen Evolution Reaction by Using Triply Fused Porphyrin

A bimetallic triply fused copper(II) porphyrin complex (1) was prepared, comprising two monomeric porphyrin units linked through β-β, meso-meso, β'-β' triple covalent linkages and exhibiting remarkable catalytic activity for the electrochemical hydrogen evolution reaction in comparison to the analogous monomeric copper(II) porphyrin complex (2). Electrochemical investigations in the presence of a proton source (trifluoroacetic acid) confirmed that the catalytic activity of the fused metalloporphyrin occurred at a significantly lower overpotential (≈320 mV) compared to the non-fused monomer. Controlled potential electrolysis combined with kinetic analysis of catalysts 1 and 2 confirmed production of hydrogen, with 96 and 71 % faradaic efficiencies and turnover numbers of 102 and 18, respectively, with an observed rate constant of around 107  s-1 for the dicopper complex. The results thus firmly establish triply fused porphyrin ligands as outstanding candidates for generating highly stable and efficient molecular electrocatalysts in combination with earth-abundant 3d transition metals.

Spinning Molecules, Spinning Spins: Modulation of an Electron Spin Exchange Interaction in a Highly Anisotropic Hyperfine Field

An investigation of spin and conformational dynamics in a series of symmetric Cu-Cu porphyrin dimer solutions is presented using electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) spectroscopy. Previous spectral simulations focused on the isotropic exchange interaction (J avg) between the Cu centers. In this work, an additional line broadening parameter (J mod) is explored in detail via variable temperature X-band EPR in liquid solution for several different structures. The J mod phenomenon is due to fluctuations in the spin exchange interaction caused by conformational motion of the porphyrin planes. The J mod parameter scales with the inverse of the rotational barriers that determine the Boltzmann-weighted torsional angle distribution between neighboring porphyrin planes. Arrhenius plots allow for extraction of the activation energies for rotation, which are 5.77, 2.84, and 5.31 kJ/mol for ethyne-bridged (porphinato)copper(II)-(porphinato)copper(II), butadiyne-bridged (porphinato)copper(II)-(porphinato)copper(II), and ethyne-bridged (porphinato)copper(II)-(porphinato)zinc(II)-(porphinato)copper(II) complexes, respectively. DFT calculations of these torsional barriers match well with the experimental results. This is the first report of a J mod analysis within a highly anisotropic hyperfine field and demonstrates the utility of the theory for extraction of dynamic information.

Accessing distributions of exchange and dipolar couplings in stiff molecular rulers with Cu(ii) centres

Novel approaches to quantitatively analyse distributed exchange couplings are described and tested on experimental data sets for stiff synthetic molecules.

Quantifying the exchange coupling in linear copper porphyrin oligomers

The unique combination of EPR, DFT and novel large-scale simulation methods provides information on exchange coupling between metal centers in molecular wires.