A conical intersection controls the deactivation of the bacterial luciferase fluorophore.

The photophysics of flavins is highly dependent on their environment. For example, 4a-hydroxy flavins display weak fluorescence in solution, but exhibit strong fluorescence when bound to a protein. To understand this behavior, we performed temperature-dependent fluorescent studies on an N(5)-alkylated 4a-hydroxy flavin: the putative bacterial luciferase fluorophore. We find an increase in fluorescence quantum yield upon reaching the glass transition temperature of the solvent. We then employ multiconfigurational quantum chemical methods to map the excited-state deactivation path of the system. The result reveals a shallow but barrierless excited state deactivation path that leads to a conical intersection displaying an orthogonal out-of-plane distortion of the terminal pyrimidine ring. The intersection structure readily explains the observed spectroscopic behavior in terms of an excited-state barrier imposed by the rigid glass cavity.

Electrode-assisted catalytic water oxidation by a flavin derivative.

The success of solar fuel technology relies on the development of efficient catalysts that can oxidize or reduce water. All molecular water-oxidation catalysts reported thus far are transition-metal complexes, however, here we report catalytic water oxidation to give oxygen by a fully organic compound, the N(5)-ethylflavinium ion, Et-Fl(+). Evolution of oxygen was detected during bulk electrolysis of aqueous Et-Fl(+) solutions at several potentials above +1.9 V versus normal hydrogen electrode. The catalysis was found to occur on glassy carbon and platinum working electrodes, but no catalysis was observed on fluoride-doped tin-oxide electrodes. Based on spectroelectrochemical results and preliminary calculations with density functional theory, one possible mechanistic route is proposed in which the oxygen evolution occurs from a peroxide intermediate formed between the oxidized flavin pseudobase and the oxidized carbon electrode. These findings offer an organic alternative to the traditional water-oxidation catalysts based on transition metals.

Photoinduced electron transfer in naphthalimide-pyridine systems: effect of proton transfer on charge recombination efficiencies.

We studied the effect of proton-coupled electron transfer on lifetimes of the charge-separated radicals produced upon light irradiation of the thiomethyl-naphthalimide donor SMe-NI-H in the presence of nitro-cyano-pyridine acceptor (NO(2)-CN-PYR). The dynamics of electron and proton transfer were studied using femtosecond pump-probe spectroscopy in the UV/vis range. We find that the photoinduced electron transfer between excited SMe-NI-H and NO(2)-CN-PYR occurs with a rate of 1.1 × 10(9) s(-1) to produce radical ions SMe-NI-H(•+) and NO(2)-CN-PYR(•-). These initially produced radical ions in a solvent cage do not undergo a proton transfer, possibly due to unfavorable geometry between N-H proton of the naphthalimide and aromatic N-atom of the pyridine. Some of the radical ions in the solvent cage recombine with a rate of 2.3 × 10(10) s(-1), while some escape the solvent cage and recombine at a lower rate (k = 4.27 × 10(8) s(-1)). The radical ions that escape the solvent cage undergo proton transfer to produce neutral radicals SMe-NI(•) and NO(2)-CN-PYR-H(•). Because neutral radicals are not attracted to each other by electrostatic interactions, their recombination is slower that the recombination of the radical ions formed in model compounds that can undergo only electron transfer (SMe-NI-Me and NO(2)-CN-PYR, k = 1.2 × 10(9) s(-1)). The results of our study demonstrate that proton-coupled electron transfer can be used as an efficient method to achieve long-lived charge separation in light-driven processes.

Fast excited-state deactivation in N(5)-ethyl-4a-hydroxyflavin pseudobase.

We present a study of the excited-state behavior of N(5)-ethyl-4a-hydroxyflavin (Et-FlOH), a model compound for bacterial bioluminescence. Using femtosecond pump-probe spectroscopy, we found that the Et-FlOH excited state exhibits multiexponential dynamics, with the dominant decay component having a 0.5 ps lifetime. Several possible mechanisms for fast excited-state decay in Et-FlOH were considered: (i) excited-state deprotonation of the -OH proton, (ii) thermal deactivation via (1)n,π* → (1)π,π* conical intersection, and (iii) excited-state release of OH(-) ion. These mechanisms were excluded based on transient absorption studies of two model compounds (N(5)-ethyl-4a-methoxyflavin, Et-FlOMe, and N(5)-ethyl-flavinium ion, Et-Fl(+)) and based on the results of time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) calculations of Et-FlOH excited-states. Instead, we propose that the fast decay in Et-FlOH is caused by S(1) → S(0) internal conversion, initiated by the excited-state nitrogen planarization (sp(3) → sp(2) hybridization change at the N(5)-atom of Et-FlOH S(1) state) coupled with out-of-plane distortion of the pyrimidine moiety of flavin.

Electronic properties of N(5)-ethyl flavinium ion.

We investigated the electronic properties of N(5)-ethyl flavinium perchlorate (Et-Fl(+)) and compared them to those of its parent compound, 3-methyllumiflavin (Fl). Absorption and fluorescence spectra of Fl and Et-Fl(+) exhibit similar spectral features, but the absorption energy of Et-Fl(+) is substantially lower than that of Fl. We calculated the absorption signatures of Fl and Et-Fl(+) using time-dependent density functional theory (TD-DFT) methods and found that the main absorption bands of Fl and Et-Fl(+) are (π,π*) transitions for the S(1) and S(3) excited states. Furthermore, calculations predict that the S(2) state has (n,π*) character. Using cyclic voltammetry and a simplistic consideration of the orbital energies, we compared the HOMO/LUMO energies of Fl and Et-Fl(+). We found that both HOMO and LUMO orbitals of Et-Fl(+) are stabilized relative to those in Fl, although the stabilization of the LUMO level was more pronounced. Visible and mid-IR pump-probe experiments demonstrate that Et-Fl(+) exhibits a shorter excited-state lifetime (590 ps) relative to that of Fl (several nanoseconds), possibly due to faster thermal deactivation in Et-Fl(+), as dictated by the energy gap law. Furthermore, we observed a fast (23-30 ps) S(2) → S(0) internal conversion in transient absorption spectra of both Fl and Et-Fl(+) in experiments that utilized pump excitations with higher energy.

Mechanism of N(5)-ethyl-flavinium cation formation upon electrochemical oxidation of N(5)-ethyl-4a-hydroxyflavin pseudobase.

We investigated the oxidation behavior of 5-ethyl-4a-hydroxy-3-methyl-4a,5-dihydrolumiflavin (pseudobase Et-FlOH) in acetonitrile with the aim of determining if the two-electron oxidized Et-FlOH(2+) undergoes a release of hydroxyl cation and the production of 5-ethyl-3methyllumiflavinium cation (Et-Fl(+)). The focus of this work is to investigate the possibility of using Et-FlOH as a catalyst for water oxidation. The cyclic voltammetry demonstrates that Et-FlOH exhibits two one-electron oxidation potentials at +0.95 and +1.4 V versus normal hydrogen electrode (NHE), with the second oxidation potential being irreversible. The production of Et-Fl(+) is observed in the cyclic voltammetry of Et-FlOH and has been previously assigned to the release of OH(+) from the two-electron oxidized Et-FlOH(2+). The results of our study show that this is not the case: (i) we performed bulk electrolysis of the electrolyte solution at +2 V and then added Et-FlOH to the electrolyzed solution. We found that Et-Fl(+) is produced from this solution, even though Et-FlOH itself was not oxidized; (ii) reactions of Et-FlOH with chemical oxidants (ceric ammonium nitrate, nitrosyl tetrafluoroborate, and tetrabutylammonium persulfate) demonstrate that Et-Fl(+) production occurs only in the presence of strong Lewis acids, such as Ce(4+) and NO(+) ions. On the basis of these results, we propose that the production of Et-Fl(+) in the electrochemistry of Et-FlOH occurs because of the shift in the Et-FlOH/Et-Fl(+) acid-base equilibrium in the presence of protons released during anodic oxidation. We identified two sources of protons: (i) oxidation of traces of water present in the acetonitrile releases oxygen and protons and (ii) two-electron oxidized Et-FlOH(2+) releases protons located on the N(5)-alkyl chain. The release of protons from Et-FlOH(2+) was confirmed by cyclic voltammetry of Et-FlOH in the presence of pyridine as a base. The first oxidation peak of Et-FlOH at +0.95 V is reversible in the absence of pyridine. The addition of pyridine leads to the shift of the oxidation potential to a less positive value, which is consistent with a proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET). Furthermore, the anodic current increases, and the cathodic peak becomes irreversible, giving rise to two additional reduction peaks at -0.2 and -1 V. The same reduction peaks were observed in the high scan rate cyclic voltammogram of Et-FlOH in the absence of pyridine, implying that the release of protons indeed occurs from Et-FlOH(2+). To determine which functional group of Et-FlOH(.+) is the source of protons, we performed DFT calculations at the B3LYP/6-311++G** level of theory for a reaction of Et-FlOH(.+) with pyridine and identified two proton sources: (i) the >N-CH(2)- group of the N(5) alkyl chain and (ii) the -OH group in the 4a-position of the radical cation. Because the appearance of new reduction peaks at -0.2 and -1.0 V occurs in the model compound that lacks -OH protons (Et-FlOMe), we conclude that the proton removal occurs predominantly from the >N-CH(2)- moiety.