Synthetically tuneable biomimetic artificial photosynthetic reaction centres that closely resemble the natural system in purple bacteria

Sai Ho Lee, Iain M. Blake, Allan G. Larsen, James A. McDonald, Kei Ohkubo, Shunichi Fukuzumi, Jeffrey R. Reimers, Maxwell J. Crossley

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

23 Scopus citations

Abstract

Porphyrin-based photosynthetic reaction centre (PRC) mimics, ZnPQ-Q2HP-C60 and MP2Q-Q2HP-C60 (M = Zn or 2H), designed to have a similar special-pair electron donor and similar charge-separation distances, redox processes and photochemical reaction rates to those in the natural PRC from purple bacteria, have been synthesised and extensive photochemical studies performed. Mechanisms of electron-transfer reactions are fully investigated using femtosecond and nanosecond transient absorption spectroscopy. In benzonitrile, all models show picosecond-timescale charge-separations and the final singlet charge-separations with the microsecond-timescale. The established lifetimes are long compared to other processes in organic solar cells or other organic light harvesting systems. These rigid, synthetically flexible molecules provide the closest mimics to the natural PRC so far synthesised and present a future direction for the design of light harvesters with controllable absorption, redox, and kinetics properties.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)6534-6550
Number of pages17
JournalChemical Science
Volume7
Issue number10
DOIs
StatePublished - 2016

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 The Royal Society of Chemistry.

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Synthetically tuneable biomimetic artificial photosynthetic reaction centres that closely resemble the natural system in purple bacteria'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this