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1. Iron Redox Shuttles with Wide Optical Gap Dyes for High‐Voltage Dye‐Sensitized Solar Cells

   https://doi.org/10.1002/cssc.202100884  

   Curiac, Christine; Rodrigues, Roberta R.; Watson, Jonathon; Hunt, Leigh Anna; Devdass, Anthony; Jurss, Jonah W.; Hammer, Nathan I.; Fortenberry, Ryan C.; Delcamp, Jared H. (June 2021, ChemSusChem)

   Abstract A series of iron polypyridyl redox shuttles were synthesized in the 2+ and 3+ oxidation states and paired with a series of wide optical gap organic dyes with weak aryl ether electron‐donating groups. High voltage dye‐sensitized solar cell (HV‐DSC) devices were obtained through controlling the redox shuttle energetics and dye donor structure. The use of aryl ether donor groups, in place of commonly used aryl amines, allowed for the lowering of the dye ground‐state oxidation potential which enabled challenging to oxidize redox shuttles based on Fe²⁺polypyridyl structures to be used in functional devices. By carefully designing a dye series that varies the number of alkyl chains for TiO₂surface protection, the recombination of electrons in TiO₂to the oxidized redox shuttle could be controlled, leading to HV‐DSC devices of up to 1.4 V. 

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2. Eliminating nonradiative decay in Cu(I) emitters: >99% quantum efficiency and microsecond lifetime

   https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aav2865  

   Hamze, Rasha; Peltier, Jesse L.; Sylvinson, Daniel; Jung, Moonchul; Cardenas, Jose; Haiges, Ralf; Soleilhavoup, Michele; Jazzar, Rodolphe; Djurovich, Peter I.; Bertrand, Guy; et al (February 2019, Science)

   Luminescent complexes of heavy metals such as iridium, platinum, and ruthenium play an important role in photocatalysis and energy conversion applications as well as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). Achieving comparable performance from more–earth-abundant copper requires overcoming the weak spin-orbit coupling of the light metal as well as limiting the high reorganization energies typical in copper(I) [Cu(I)] complexes. Here we report that two-coordinate Cu(I) complexes with redox active ligands in coplanar conformation manifest suppressed nonradiative decay, reduced structural reorganization, and sufficient orbital overlap for efficient charge transfer. We achieve photoluminescence efficiencies >99% and microsecond lifetimes, which lead to an efficient blue-emitting OLED. Photophysical analysis and simulations reveal a temperature-dependent interplay between emissive singlet and triplet charge-transfer states and amide-localized triplet states. 

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3. Encapsulation of tricopper cluster in a synthetic cryptand enables facile redox processes from Cu ^I Cu ^I Cu ^I to Cu ^II Cu ^II Cu ^II states

   https://doi.org/10.1039/D0SC05441K  

   Zhang, Weiyao; Moore, Curtis E.; Zhang, Shiyu (March 2021, Chemical Science)

   null (Ed.)

   One-pot reaction of tris(2-aminoethyl)amine (TREN), [Cu I (MeCN) 4 ]PF 6 , and paraformaldehyde affords a mixed-valent [ TREN4 Cu II Cu I Cu I (μ 3 -OH)](PF 6 ) 3 complex. The macrocyclic azacryptand TREN4 contains four TREN motifs, three of which provide a bowl-shape binding pocket for the [Cu 3 (μ 3 -OH)] 3+ core. The fourth TREN caps on top of the tricopper cluster to form a cryptand, imposing conformational constraints and preventing solvent interaction. Contrasting the limited redox capability of synthetic tricopper complexes reported so far, [ TREN4 Cu II Cu I Cu I (μ 3 -OH)](PF 6 ) 3 exhibits several reversible single-electron redox events. The distinct electrochemical behaviors of [ TREN4 Cu II Cu I Cu I (μ 3 -OH)](PF 6 ) 3 and its solvent-exposed analog [ TREN3 Cu II Cu II Cu II (μ 3 -O)](PF 6 ) 4 suggest that isolation of tricopper core in a cryptand enables facile electron transfer, allowing potential application of synthetic tricopper complexes as redox catalysts. Indeed, the fully reduced [ TREN4 Cu I Cu I Cu I (μ 3 -OH)](PF 6 ) 2 can reduce O 2 under acidic conditions. The geometric constraints provided by the cryptand are reminiscent of Nature's multicopper oxidases (MCOs). For the first time, a synthetic tricopper cluster was isolated and fully characterized at Cu I Cu I Cu I ( 4a ), Cu II Cu I Cu I ( 4b ), and Cu II Cu II Cu I ( 4c ) states, providing structural and spectroscopic models for many intermediates in MCOs. Fast electron transfer rates (10 5 to 10 6 M −1 s −1 ) were observed for both Cu I Cu I Cu I /Cu II Cu I Cu I and Cu II Cu I Cu I /Cu II Cu II Cu I redox couples, approaching the rapid electron transfer rates of copper sites in MCO. 

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4. Iodine binding with thiophene and furan based dyes for DSCs

   https://doi.org/10.1039/c8cp03065k  

   Baumann, Alexandra; Cheema, Hammad; Sabuj, Md Abdus; McNamara, Louis E.; Zhang, Yanbing; Peddapuram, Adithya; Nguyen, Suong T.; Watkins, Davita L.; Hammer, Nathan I.; Rai, Neeraj; et al (January 2018, Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics)

   Iodine binding to thiophene rings in dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) has been hypothesized to be performance degrading in a number of literature cases. Binding of iodine to dyes near the semiconductor surface can promote undesirable electron transfers and lower the overall efficiency of devices. Six thiophene or furan containing dye analogs were synthesized to analyze iodine binding to the dyes via Raman spectroscopy, UV-Vis studies, device performance metrics and density functional theory (DFT) based computations. Evidence suggests I 2 binds thiophene-based dyes stronger than furan-based dyes. This leads to higher DSC device currents and voltages from furan analogues, and longer electron lifetimes in DSC devices using furan based dyes. Raman spectrum of the TiO 2 surface-bound dyes reveals additional and more instense peaks for thiophene dyes in the presence of I 2 relative to no I 2 . Additionally, broader and shifted UV-Vis peaks are observed for thiophene dyes in the presence of I 2 on TiO 2 films suggesting significant interaction between the dye molecules and I 2 . These observations are also supported by DFT and TD-DFT calculations which indicate the absence of a key geometric energy minimum in the dye–I 2 ground state for furan dyes which are readily observed for the thiophene based analogues. 

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5. Crystal structures of three copper(II)–2,2′-bipyridine (bpy) compounds, [Cu(bpy) ₂ (H ₂ O)][SiF ₆ ]·4H ₂ O, [Cu(bpy) ₂ (TaF ₆ ) ₂ ] and [Cu(bpy) ₃ ][TaF ₆ ] ₂ and a related coordination polymer, [Cu(bpy)(H ₂ O) ₂ SnF ₆ ] _n

   https://doi.org/10.1107/S2056989021000633  

   Nisbet, Matthew L.; Hiralal, Emily; Poeppelmeier, Kenneth R. (February 2021, Acta Crystallographica Section E Crystallographic Communications)

   null (Ed.)

   We report the hydrothermal syntheses and crystal structures of aquabis(2,2′-bipyridine-κ 2 N , N ′)copper(II) hexafluoridosilicate tetrahydrate, [Cu(bpy) 2 (H 2 O)][SiF 6 ]·4H 2 O (bpy is 2,2′-bipyridine, C 10 H 8 N 2 ), (I), bis(2,2′-bipyridine-3κ 2 N , N ′)-di-μ-fluorido-1:3κ 2 F : F ;2:3κ 2 F : F -decafluorido-1κ 5 F ,2κ 5 F -ditantalum(V)copper(II), [Cu(bpy) 2 (TaF 6 ) 2 ], (II), tris(2,2′-bipyridine-κ 2 N , N ′)copper(II) bis[hexafluoridotantalate(V)], [Cu(bpy) 3 ][TaF 6 ] 2 , (III), and catena -poly[[diaqua(2,2′-bipyridine-κ 2 N , N ′)copper(II)]-μ-fluorido-tetrafluoridotin-μ-fluorido], [Cu(bpy)(H 2 O) 2 SnF 6 ] n , (IV). Compounds (I), (II) and (III) contain locally chiral copper coordination complexes with C 2 , D 2 , and D 3 symmetry, respectively. The extended structures of (I) and (IV) are consolidated by O—H...F and O—H...O hydrogen bonds. The structure of (III) was found to be a merohedral (racemic) twin. 

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