The Story of 5d Metallocorroles: From Metal–Ligand Misfits to New Building Blocks for Cancer Phototherapeutics

CONSPECTUS: Porphyrin chemistry is Shakespearean: over a century of study has not withered the field’s apparently infinite variety. Heme proteins continually astonish us with novel molecular mechanisms, while new porphyrin analogues bowl us over with unprecedented optical, electronic, and metal-binding properties. Within the latter domain, corroles occupy a special place, exhibiting a unique and rich coordination chemistry. The 5d metallocorroles are arguably the icing on that cake. New Zealand chemist Penny Brothers has used the word “misfit” to describe the interactions of boron, a small atom with a predilection for tetrahedral coordination, and porphyrins, classic square-planar ligands. Steve Jobs lionized misfits as those who see things differently and push humanity forward. Both perspectives have inspired us. The 5d metallocorroles are misfits in that they encapsulate a large 5d transition metal ion within the tight cavity of a contracted porphyrin ligand. Given the steric mismatch inherent in their structures, the syntheses of some 5d metallocorroles are understandably capricious, proceeding under highly specific conditions and affording poor yields. Three broad approaches may be distinguished. (a) In the metal−alkyl approach, a free-base corrole is exposed to an alkyllithium and the resulting lithio-corrole is treated with an early transition metal chloride; a variant of the method eschews alkyllithium and deploys a transition metal−alkyl instead, resulting in elimination of the alkyl group as an alkane and insertion of the metal into the corrole. This approach is useful for inserting transition metals from groups 4, 5, and, to some extent, 6, as well as lanthanides and actinides. (b) In our laboratory, we have often deployed a low-valent organometallic approach for the middle transition elements (groups 6, 7, 8, and 9). The reagents are low-valent metal−carbonyl or −olefin complexes, which lose one or more carbon ligands at high temperature, affording coordinatively unsaturated, sticky metal fragments that are trapped by the corrole nitrogens. (c) Finally, a metal acetate approach provides the method of choice for gold and platinum insertion (groups 10 and 11). This Account provides a first-hand perspective of the three approaches, focusing on the last two, which were largely developed in our laboratory. In general, the products were characterized with X-ray crystallography, electrochemistry, and a variety of spectroscopic methods. The physicochemical data, supplemented by relativistic DFT calculations, have provided fascinating insights into periodic trends and relativistic effects. An unexpected feature of many 5d metallocorroles, given their misfit character, is their remarkable stability under thermal, chemical, and photochemical stimulation. Many of them also exhibit long triplet lifetimes on the order of 100 μs and effectively sensitize singlet oxygen formation. Many exhibit phosphorescence in the near-infrared under ambient conditions. Furthermore, water-soluble ReO and Au corroles exhibit impressive photocytotoxicity against multiple cancer cell lines, promising potential applications as cancer phototherapeutics. We thus envision a bright future for the compounds as rugged building blocks for new generations of therapeutic and diagnostic (theranostic) agents.