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The development of multicomponent molecular systems for the photocatalytic reduction of water to hydrogen has experienced considerable growth since the end of the 1970s. Recently, with the aim of improving the efficiency of the catalysis, single-component photocatalysts have been developed in which the photosensitizer is chemically coupled to the hydrogen-evolving catalyst in the same molecule through a bridging ligand. Until now, none of these photocatalysts has operated efficiently in pure aqueous solution: a highly desirable medium for energy-conversion applications. Herein, we introduce a new ruthenium-rhodium polypyridyl complex as the first efficient homogeneous photocatalyst for H2 production in water with turnover numbers of several hundred. This study also demonstrates unambiguously that the catalytic performance of such systems linked through a nonconjugated bridge is significantly improved as compared to that of a mixture of the separate components. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rh and Ir complexes that contain meso-( p-methoxyphenyl)dipyrromethene (dipy) and phenylpyridine (ppy) ligands {i.e., [Rh(dipy)3], [Rh(ppy)2(dipy)] and [Ir(ppy)2(dipy)]} have been prepared and their electrochemical and luminescence behaviour are discussed and compared to results of theoretical calculations. The oxidation and reduction potentials, in agreement with the time-dependent (TD)-DFT calculations, indicate clearly that the HOMO-LUMO transitions are governed by the dipy ligand, which controls also the triplet excited-state emission. However, in luminescence, the two Rh complexes exhibit, in addition to a dipy-centred triplet emission, luminescence from the singlet excited state, which predominates at room temperature, due to a less important influence of the heavy-metal effect in Rh than in Ir complexes. Although the TD-DFT results are in very good agreement with the experimental emission spectra from the dipy-centred triplet excited state, this is not the case for the absorption spectra of the complexes and free dipy ligand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report a very efficient homogeneous system for the visible-light-driven hydrogen production in pure aqueous solution at room temperature. This comprises [RhIII(dmbpy)2Cl2]Cl ( 1) as catalyst, [Ru(bpy)3]Cl2 ( PS1) as photosensitizer, and ascorbate as sacrificial electron donor. Comparative studies in aqueous solutions also performed with other known rhodium catalysts, or with an iridium photosensitizer, show that 1) the PS1/ 1/ascorbate/ascorbic acid system is by far the most active rhodium-based homogeneous photocatalytic system for hydrogen production in a purely aqueous medium when compared to the previously reported rhodium catalysts, Na3[RhI(dpm)3Cl] and [RhIII(bpy)Cp*(H2O)]SO4 and 2) the system is less efficient when [IrIII(ppy)2(bpy)]Cl ( PS2) is used as photosensitizer. Because catalyst 1 is the most efficient rhodium-based H2-evolving catalyst in water, the performance limits of this complex were further investigated by varying the PS1/ 1 ratio at pH 4.0. Under optimal conditions, the system gives up to 1010 turnovers versus the catalyst with an initial turnover frequency as high as 857 TON h−1. Nanosecond transient absorption spectroscopy measurements show that the initial step of the photocatalytic H2-evolution mechanism is a reductive quenching of the PS1 excited state by ascorbate, leading to the reduced form of PS1, which is then able to reduce [RhIII(dmbpy)2Cl2]+ to [RhI(dmbpy)2]+. This reduced species can react with protons to yield the hydride [RhIII(H)(dmbpy)2(H2O)]2+, which is the key intermediate for the H2 production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]