With support from the Inorganic, Bioinorganic and Organometallic Chemistry Program, Dr. David N. Hendrickson of the University of California, San Diego will undertake an investigation of electronically labile transition metal complexes. These include systems that exhibit spin crossover (between two spin states centered on the metal), valence tautomerism (transfer between the metal and a coordinated ligand), and intervalence transfer in binuclear complexes (transfer between two metal centers that have different oxidation states). These studies will employ a broad range of Techniques for physical inorganic studies as well as molecular mechanics calculations of substituent and lattice solvent motions to aid in the determination of the factors affecting the rate of electron hopping and the lifetimes of excited states. Such electronically labile systems could provide the basis for optical switches, information storage devices, and other electronic components. %%% Electron movement between orbitals (states) in a variety of solid state, transition metal compounds will be investigated. The goal of these studies is to understand the structural factors that govern the rates of electron movement between states and the lifetimes of higher energy (excited) states. Such an understanding is critical to technological applications of such transition metal compounds for optical switches, information storage devices, and other electronic components.
