9400919 Ford U. of Calif. - Santa Barbara Dr. Peter Ford, Chemistry Department, University of California - Santa Barbara, is supported by the Inorganic, Bioinorganic, and Organometallic Chemistry Program for studies of the photoreaction and photophysical mechanisms of transition metal coordination and organometallic complexes. A series of strongly luminescing mononuclear and cluster compounds containing Cu(I) will be synthesized and spectroscopically characterized using both CW and pulse laser excitations, and the uni- and bimolecular ES dynamics will be determined by emission and transient absorption detection. The spectroscopic and bonding properties of the complexes will be evaluated with the aid of theoretical calculations. The photochemistry of several nitric oxide complexes will be examined both in order to understand the fundamental properties of coordinated NO and to prepare dual chromophore systems which might serve as sensors for solution NO. When light is absorbed by a molecule, the energy which the molecule acquires is sometime re-emitted as light of a different wave length (this is called luminescence) and sometimes by initiating a chemical reaction within the molecule. This project is designed to probe both possibilities. By using a specially designed series of copper compounds the details of how luminescence occurs. This has great importance to, for example, the design of light emitting electronic devices. In another portions the reactions of metal complexes of nitric oxide (NO) will be examined as the complexes are exposed to intense light. This has relevance to the design of sensors which can detect NO, which has important biochemical roles, in solution.
