Symmetric vs. asymmetric squaraines as photosensitisers in mesoscopic injection solar cells: a structure-property relationship study.

A symmetric squaraine and its related non-symmetric structure are shown to have comparable efficiencies in DSCs, but with undoubtedly advantages in the low cost and easiness of synthesis for the symmetrical structure.

Photoactive hybrid nanomaterials: indocyanine immobilized in mesoporous MCM-41 for "in-cell" bioimaging.

Mesoporous silica nanoparticles are being explored as versatile tools for various biomedical and biotechnological applications including disease diagnosis, drug delivery, and intracellular imaging. In this paper, the synthesis and characterization of a fluorescent hybrid mesoporous silica nanomaterial, which is noncytotoxic and shows great potential for "in-cell" bioimaging applications, will be described. The hybrid mesoporous material has been obtained by confining highly fluorescent organic dyes, belonging to the indocyanine family, within the channels of mesoporous MCM-41. To explore the dispersion of the dye inside the mesoporous channels and the formation of dye aggregates, several hybrid samples with increasing dye/MCM-41 loading (up to 100 mg/g) were prepared. A uniform distribution of monomeric 1,1'-diethyl-3,3,3',3'-tetramethylindocarbocyanine iodide has been achieved at low dye loading (1 mg/g), as evidenced by photoluminescence spectra and lifetime, while a progressive formation of J-aggregates is induced by an increase in the dye loading. To elucidate the properties of the dye immobilized in mesoporous MCM-41, a detailed physical chemical characterization by structural (X-ray diffraction), volumetric and optical (Fourier transform infrared, diffuse-reflectance UV-vis and photoluminescence) techniques has been performed. By ultrasonication of the bulk material, nanoparticles of 2-20 nm diameter were obtained. Biocompatibility, endocytic uptake, and intracellular compartmentalization of such fluorescent nanoparticles were investigated in mammalian cultured cells.

Integrated approach for modeling the emission fluorescence of 4-(N,N-dimethylamino)benzonitrile in polar environments.

A stochastic model for the interpretation of the emission fluorescence of 4-( N, N-dimethylamino)benzonitrile (DMABN) is discussed. We proceed by reviewing the stochastic modeling approach ( Polimeno, A. ; Barbon, A. ; Nordio, P. L. ; Rettig, W. J. Phys. Chem. 1994, 98, 12158 ), in which internal degrees of freedom are coupled with an effective solvent relaxation variable. Potential energy surfaces are obtained using a reliable but computationally cost-effective quantum mechanical (QM) approach, and estimates of dissipative parameters are calculated on the basis of direct hydrodynamic arguments. Emission fluorescence is estimated by solving numerically a diffusion/sink/source equation for the stationary population of excited state and compared to emission fluorescence of DMABN measured experimentally.

Order parameters of alpha,omega-diphenylpolyenes in a nematic liquid crystal from an integrated computational and 13C NMR spectroscopic approach.

The orientational order parameters and conformational behavior of five relatively large rodlike molecules, biphenyl, trans-stilbene, 1,3-diphenyl-butadiene, 1,3,5-diphenyl-hexatriene, and 1,3,5,7-diphenyl-octatetraene, dissolved in the thermotropic liquid crystal ZLI-1167, have been studied using an integrated approach combining (13)C NMR measurements and quantum mechanical computations of carbon chemical shift tensors. Besides biphenyl, the phenyl moiety of all structures has been found to have a high rotational mobility in the temperature range of the present experiments. The rank-two order parameter in the nematic phase is found to increase steadily from the shortest to the longest term of the series at any temperature within the nematic range. The molecular biaxiality order parameter is found to be small and essentially constant with temperature, giving further support to the common assumption of effective uniaxiality for these probes.

Accurate prediction of electron-paramagnetic-resonance tensors for spin probes dissolved in liquid crystals.

High-level ab initio g and A tensor components have been calculated for PD-tempone and tempo-palmitate (TP) radical spin probes dissolved in n-pentyl and n-hexyl cyanobiphenyl liquid crystals. Solvent effects have been included in the proposed approach by means of the polarizable continuum model, allowing for solvent anisotropy. An in-depth analysis of the electronic structure of probes was performed to choose a suitable model for TP and make the calculations more accessible. Computed magnetic tensor components have been compared with corresponding values measured in the rigid limit. The quality of the results suggests the use of quantum-mechanical data to determine the order parameter of the nematic from experimental electron-spin resonance measurements.

Building cavities in a fluid of spherical or rod-like particles: a contribution to the solvation free energy in isotropic and anisotropic polarizable continuum model.

A general formalism for the calculation of cavitation energies in the framework of the scaled particle theory has been implemented in the Polarizable Continuum Model (PCM), contributing to the nonelectrostatic part of the molecular free energy in solution. The solute cavity and the solvent molecules are described as hard spherocylinders, whose radius and length are related to the actual molecular shape, while the solvent density is estimated from experimental data, or from the solvent molecular volume, suitably scaled. The present model can describe isotropic solutions of spherical and rod-like molecules in spherical or rod-like solvents, and also anisotropic solutions in which the solvent molecules are oriented in space: in this case, the cavitation energy also depends on the relative orientation of solute and solvent molecules. Test calculations have been performed on simple systems to evaluate the accuracy of the present approach, in comparison with other methods and with the available experimental estimates of the cavitation energy, giving encouraging results.

A combined theoretical and experimental approach to determining order parameters of solutes in liquid crystals from 13C NMR data.

The ordering properties of an anisotropic liquid crystal can be studied by recording 13C NMR spectra at different temperatures for a number of rigid solutes. The traditional difficulty in analyzing 13C data comes from the scarcity of experimental information about the carbon shielding tensors and from their limited transferability among different solutes. We show that these obstacles can be overcome by computing high-level ab initio shielding tensors, also including the solvent effects by the polarizable continuum model. The reliability of this combined approach is carefully verified, and the order parameters of several solutes are obtained by reanalyzing previously published spectra. The quality of the results is shown to be comparable to deuterium NMR without the need of isotopic substitution.

Reliable NMR chemical shifts for molecules in solution by methods rooted in density functional theory.

The conceptual and numerical problems involved in the computation of reliable NMR chemical shifts for molecules in condensed phases are analyzed with reference to a number of case studies ranging from aromatic compounds in low-polarity solvents to carbonyl and amidic models in aqueous solution and to large polypeptides. The results show that an integrated tool including the most recent density functionals, mixed discrete-continuum solvent models, hybrid QM/MM approaches and, when needed, averaging from molecular dynamics simulations are becoming an invaluable complement to experimental results.

Understanding the role of stereoelectronic effects in determining collagen stability. 2. A quantum mechanical/molecular mechanical study of (Proline-Proline-Glycine)(n) polypeptides.

The importance of vicinal and long-range interresidue effects in determining the stability of the collagen triple helix has been investigated by quantum mechanical (QM) and molecular mechanical (MM) computations on suitable model polypeptides, taking into account solvent effects by the polarizable continuum model (PCM). At the QM level, the PII conformation corresponds to an energy minimum for pentapeptide analogues incorporating the sequence Gly-Pro-Pro-Gly, irrespective of the down or up puckering of the pyrrolidine ring. However, our computations indicate that the alternation of down and up prolines characterizing collagen and collagen-like peptides is not due to an intrinsic preference of the Pro-Pro-Gly sequence. This result is confirmed by MM computations of longer polypeptides. Next, MM computations on model triple helices show that a better packing is obtained for specific values of backbone dihedrals, which, in turn, favor the alternation of down and up prolines along each chain.

Quantum mechanical study of the conformational behavior of proline and 4R-hydroxyproline dipeptide analogues in vacuum and in aqueous solution.

The conformational behavior of the title compounds has been investigated by Hartree-Fock, MP2, and DFT computations on the most significant structures related to variations of the backbone dihedral angles, cis/trans isomerism around the peptide bond, and diastereoisomeric puckering of the pyrrolidine ring. In vacuum the reversed gamma turn (gammal), characterized by an intramolecular hydrogen bridge, corresponds to the absolute energy minimum for both puckerings (up and down) of the pyrrolidine ring. An additional energy minimum is found in the helix region, but only for an up puckering of the pyrrolidine ring. When solvent effects are included by means of the polarizable continuum model the conformer observed experimentally in condensed phases becomes the absolute minimum. The down puckering is always favored over its up counterpart, albeit by different amounts (0.4-0.5 kcal/mol for helical structures and about 2 kcal/mol for gammal structures). In helical structures cis arrangements of the peptide bond are only slightly less stable than their trans counterparts. This is no longer true for gammal structures, because the formation of an intramolecular hydrogen bond is possible only for trans peptide bonds. In most cases, proline and hydroxyproline show the same general trends; however, the electronegative 4(R) substituent of hydroxyproline leads to a strong preference for up puckerings irrespective of the backbone conformation.