Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol.133, No.39, 15332-15334, 2011
Discovering the Balance of Steric and Electronic Factors Needed To Provide a New Structural Motif for Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production from Water
Ru,Rh,Ru supramolecules are known to undergo multielectron photoreduction and reduce H(2)O to H(2). Ru, Rh bimetallics were recently shown to photoreduce but not catalyze H(2)O reduction. Careful tuning of sterics and electronics for [(TL)(2)Ru(dpp)RhCl(2)(TL')](3+) produce active bimetallic photocatalysts (TL = terminal ligand). The system with TL,TL' = Ph(2)phen photocatalytically reduces H(2)O to H(2) while TL,TL' = phen,bpy or bpy,(t)Bu(2)bpy do not.