Excitation Energy Relaxation Processes Involving Chlorophyll Molecules In Vitro: Solutions and Self-Organized Nanoassemblies

The review presents the main results obtained by the Belorussian scientific school of Acad. G.P. Gurinovich and his followers in the in the research on the spectral kinetic properties and photonics of pigment-pigment interactions of chlorophyll and its close analogs in vitro (from highly concentrated solutions to structurally organized heterogeneous nanoassemblies of various morphology), as well as on the interactions of multiporphyrin nanoassemblies with molecular oxygen. The adequacy of various theoretical models that describe the primary processes of photosynthesis (electronic excitation energy transfer and photoinduced charge transport) at short interchromophore distances, considering the properties of the medium and the conformational dynamics of interacting subunits, is substantiated. Application-oriented aspects concerning the use of multicomponent nanostructures on the basis of photostable tetrapyrrole compounds with controllable electron-transport properties and conformational mobility for the development of element base in molecular electronics, photonics, medicine, and nanobiotechnology are considered in brief. Keywords: photosynthesis, chlorophylls, porphyrins, covalently-linked porphyrin and chlorin dimers, self-assembled multiporphyrin complexes, ordered polymeric aggregates of photosynthetic pigments, CdSe/ZnS semiconductor nanocrystals-porphyrin nanoassemblies, deactivation of excited singlet and triplet states, energy transfer, photoinduced electron transfer, singlet oxygen DOI: 10.1134/S1070363219120442