Dr. David R. McMillin of the Chemistry Department, Purdue University, is being supported by the Inorganic, Bioinorganic, and Organometallic Program to investigate coordinately unsaturated excited states associated with metal complexes containing 8, 9, or 10 'd' electrons. Specifically, the complexes are copper phenanthrolines and porphyrins and platinum(II) terpyridines. McMillan will identify the orbitals involved in the excited states and assess the role of d-orbitals in reactivity. Absorption spectroscopy, circular dichroism, and luminescence spectroscopy will be employed and emission lifetimes and polarization effects will be measured as a function of temperature. Viscometry will be used in the DNA-binding studies to help ascertain the binding modes of the complex. %%% The objective of the work is to characterize the luminescence properties of these complexes so that their interaction with a variety of "hosts" can be assessed. The excited states of these complexes are sensitive to their local environment, so they can be used as structural probes. McMillan will investigate their interactions with macromolecules, including DNA and RNA, and with layered lattices. The results could have application to catalyst design.
