Cyclometalated Iridium(III) Complexes as Photosensitizers for Long-Range Electron Transfer: Occurrence of a Coulomb Barrier

Six cyclometalated iridium(III) complexes were investigated to assess their potential as photosensitizers for long-range electron transfer, and two of them were incorporated directly into covalent donor-bridge-acceptor molecules. The influence of ligand substitutions on the excited-state properties and the photoredox behavior of the iridium complexes was explored by optical absorption, steady-state and time-resolved luminescence spectroscopy, as well as by electrochemical methods. Bimolecular electron transfer between the photoexcited complexes and 10-inethylphenothiazine and methylviologen was found to be only weakly dependent on the ligand substitutions. Intramolecular long-range electron transfer from phenothiazine to photoexcited iridium(III) in the dyads is slow due to the occurrence of a Coulomb barrier. Consequently, an electron-transfer photoproduct is only observable in the transient absorption spectrum of a donor-bridge-acceptor molecule with a fluorinated photosensitizer that exhibits a very long excited-state lifetime. A flash-quench technique is necessary for detection of an electron-transfer product in the dyad with a non-fluorinated photosensitizer. The occurrence of a Coulomb barrier associated with intramolecular (excited-state) long-range electron transfer in the dyads with cyclometalated iridium(III) photosensitizers represents an important difference to previously investigated similar donor-bridge-acceptor molecules with photosensitizers based on d(6) metal diimine complexes. ((C) Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, 69451 Weinheim, Germany, 2009)