Mimicry of the Radical Pair and Triplet States in Photosynthetic Reaction Centers with a Synthetic Model

Supramolecular systems synthesized to model the photosynthetic reaction center (RC) are designed to mimic several key properties of the RC protein. Thus far, most RC models fulfill only a subset of these criteria, with very few reports employing time-resolved electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy (TREPR). We now report TREPR results on a photosynthetic model system (1) in a nematic liquid crystal (LC) that does not contain the natural pigments, yet closely mimics the spin dynamics of triplet state formation found only in photosynthetic RCs. The design of supermolecule 1 follows criteria established for promoting high quantum yield charge separation in glassy media. The observation of this triplet state in 1 by TREPR demonstrates that most of the electronic states found in the primary photochemistry of photosynthetic RCs can be mimicked successfully in synthetic models interacting with LCs. 12 refs., 3 figs.