Quest for the Most Aromatic Pathway in Charged Expanded Porphyrins.

Despite the central role of aromaticity in the chemistry of expanded porphyrins, the evaluation of aromaticity remains difficult for these extended macrocycles. The presence of multiple conjugation pathways and different planar and nonplanar π-conjugation topologies makes the quantification of global and local aromaticity even more challenging. In neutral expanded porphyrins, the predominance of the aromatic conjugation pathway passing through the imine-type nitrogens and circumventing the amino NH groups is established. However, for charged macrocycles, the question about the main conjugation circuit remains open. Accordingly, different conjugation pathways in a set of neutral, anionic, and cationic expanded porphyrins were investigated by means of several aromaticity indices rooted in the structural, magnetic, and electronic criteria. Overall, our results reveal the predominance of the conjugation pathway that passes through all nitrogen atoms to describe the aromaticity of deprotonated expanded porphyrins, while the outer pathway through the perimeter carbon atoms becomes the most aromatic in protonated macrocycles. In nonplanar and charged macrocycles, a discrepancy between electronic and magnetic descriptors is observed. Nevertheless, our work demonstrates AVmin remains the best tool to determine the main conjugation pathway of expanded porphyrins.

Enhancing Dual-State Emission in Maleimide Fluorophores through Fluorocarbon Functionalisation.

Herein, a library of trifluoroethyl substituted aminomaleimide derivatives are reported with small size and enhanced emissions in both solution and solid-state. A diCH2 CF3 substituted aminochloromaleimide exhibits the most efficient dual-state emission (Φf >50 % in solution and solid-state), with reduced quenching from protic solvents. This is attributed to the reduction of electron density on the maleimide ring and suppressed π-π stacking in the solid-state. This mechanism was explored in-depth by crystallographic analysis, and modelling of the electronic distribution of HOMO-LUMO isosurfaces and NCI plots. Hence, these dual-state dyes overcome the limitations of single-state luminescence and will serve as an important step forward for this rapidly developing nascent field.

Reply to the Correspondence on "How Aromatic Are Molecular Nanorings? The Case of a Six-Porphyrin Nanoring".

A recent article by Anderson and co-workers challenges our conclusions on the aromaticity of the four oxidation states of a butadyine-linked six-porphyrin nanoring, based on the experimental 1 H-NMR data and some recent calculations they have performed using the BLYP35 functional. Here, we show that BLYP35 should be taken with caution and demonstrate that the indirect evidence of a ring current from experimental 1 H-NMR data is not a definite proof of aromaticity.

Fluorescent Imidazo[1,2-a]pyrimidine Compounds as Biocompatible Organic Photosensitizers that Generate Singlet Oxygen: A Potential Tool for Phototheranostics.

Photodynamic therapy has been used to treat a variety of diseases, however, there is continuing search for new biocompatible photosensitizers. Herein, we demonstrate for the first time that imidazo[1,2-a]pyrimidine compounds are able to generate singlet oxygen species and can act as photosensitizers in the intracellular environment. Our results show that this class of compounds absorb and emit in the 400-500 nm region, present low cytotoxicity in the dark, are efficiently uptaken by cells, are fluorescent in intracellular medium, and generate singlet oxygen upon irradiation, killing cancer cells within 2 h at low concentration (2.0 µm). The imidazo[1,2-a]pyrimidine compounds are a potential new tool for phototheranostics, because they can be simultaneously used for fluorescence imaging and photodynamic therapy.

How Aromatic Are Molecular Nanorings? The Case of a Six-Porphyrin Nanoring*.

Large conjugated rings with persistent currents are novel promising structures in molecular-scale electronics. A six-porphyrin nanoring structure that allegedly sustained an aromatic ring current involving 78π electrons was recently synthesized. We provide here compelling evidence that this molecule is not aromatic, contrary to what was inferred from the analysis of 1 H-NMR data and computational calculations that suffer from large delocalization errors. The main reason behind the absence of an aromatic ring current in these nanorings is the low delocalization in the transition from the porphyrins to the bridging butadiyne linkers, which disrupts the overall conjugated circuit. These results highlight the importance of choosing a suitable computational method to study large conjugated molecules and the appropriate aromaticity descriptors to identify the part of the molecule responsible for the loss of aromaticity.

Discovering Biomolecules with Huisgenase Activity: Designed Repeat Proteins as Biocatalysts for (3 + 2) Cycloadditions.

Designed repeat proteins catalyze the 1,3-dipolar reaction between an imine and a π-deficient dipolarophile in THF solution to form unnatural nitroproline esters, a reaction that no enzyme can catalyze. NMR studies and mutation experiments show that both acidic and basic residues can catalyze the reaction. The diastereocontrol of the reaction depends on the flexibility of the protein and on the number and location of the active lysine and glutamate residues, which can participate independently or forming dyads that promote the formation of unusual diastereomeric cycloadducts. QM/MM calculations permit one to rationalize the origins of this Huisgenase activity and of its diastereocontrol.

How do the Hückel and Baird Rules Fade away in Annulenes?

Two of the most popular rules to characterize the aromaticity of molecules are those due to Hückel and Baird, which govern the aromaticity of singlet and triplet states. In this work, we study how these rules fade away as the ring structure increases and an optimal overlap between p orbitals is no longer possible due to geometrical restrictions. To this end, we study the lowest-lying singlet and triplet states of neutral annulenes with an even number of carbon atoms between four and eighteen. First of all, we analyze these rules from the Hückel molecular orbital method and, afterwards, we perform a geometry optimization of the annulenes with several density functional approximations in order to analyze the effect that the distortions from planarity produce on the aromaticity of annulenes. Finally, we analyze the performance of three density functional approximations that employ different percentages of Hartree-Fock exchange (B3LYP, CAM-B3LYP and M06-2X) and Hartree-Fock. Our results reveal that functionals with a low percentage of Hartree-Fock exchange at long ranges suffer from severe delocalization errors that result in wrong geometrical structures and the overestimation of the aromatic character of annulenes.

New electron delocalization tools to describe the aromaticity in porphyrinoids.

The role of aromaticity in porphyrinoids is a current subject of debate due to the intricate structure of these macrocycles, which can adopt Hückel, Möbius and even figure-eight conformers. One of the main challenges in these large π-conjugated structures is identifying the most conjugated pathway because, among aromaticity descriptors, there are very few that can be applied coherently to this variety of conformers. In this paper, we have investigated the conjugated pathways in nine porphyrinoid compounds using several aromaticity descriptors, including BLA, BOA, FLU and HOMA, as well as the recently introduced AV1245 and AVmin indices. All the indices agree on the general features of these compounds, such as the fulfillment of Hückel's rule or which compounds should be more or less aromatic from the series. However, our results evince the difficulty of finding the most aromatic pathway in the macrocycle for large porphyrinoids. In fact, only AVmin is capable of recognizing the annulene pathway as the most aromatic one in the nine studied structures. Finally, we study the effect of the exchange in DFT functionals on the description of the aromaticity of the porphyrinoids. The amount of exact exchange quantitatively changes the picture for most aromaticity descriptors, AVmin being the only exception that shows the same qualitative results in all cases.

Density Functional Theory Study on the Demethylation Reaction between Methylamine, Dimethylamine, Trimethylamine, and Tamoxifen Catalyzed by a Fe(IV)-Oxo Porphyrin Complex.

In this work, we studied computationally the N-demethylation reaction of methylamine, dimethylamine, and trimethylamine as archetypal examples of primary, secondary, and tertiary amines catalyzed by high-field low-spin Fe-containing enzymes such as cytochromes P450. Using DFT calculations, we found that the expected C-H hydroxylation process was achieved for trimethylamine. When dimethylamine and methylamine were studied, two different reaction mechanisms (C-H hydroxylation and a double hydrogen atom transfer) were computed to be energetically accessible and both are equally preferred. Both processes led to the formation of formaldehyde and the N-demethylated substrate. Finally, as an illustrative example, the relative contribution of the three primary oxidation routes of tamoxifen was rationalized through energetic barriers obtained from density functional calculations and docking experiments involving CYP3A4 and CYP2D6 isoforms. We found that the N-demethylation process was the intrinsically favored one, whereas other oxidation reactions required most likely preorganization imposed by the residues close to the active sites.

Relevance of the DFT method to study expanded porphyrins with different topologies.

Meso-aryl expanded porphyrins present a structural versatility that allows them to achieve different topologies with distinct aromaticities. Several studies appeared in the literature studying these topological switches from an experimental and theoretical point of view. Most of these publications include density functional theory calculations, being the B3LYP the most used methodology. In this work, we show that the selection of the functional has a critical role on the geometric, energetic, and magnetic results of these expanded porphyrins, and that the use of an inadequate methodology can even generate spurious stationary points on the potential energy surface. To illustrate these aspects, in this article we have studied different molecular distortions of two expanded porphyrins, [32]-heptaphyrin and [26]-hexaphyrin using 11 DFT functionals and performing single point energy calculations at the local pair natural orbital coupled cluster DLPNO-CCSD(T) method, which have been carried out for benchmarking purposes. For some selected functionals, the dispersion effects have also been evaluated using the D3-Grimme's dispersion correction with Becke-Johnson damping. Our results let us to conclude that the CAM-B3LYP, M05-2X, and M06-2X functionals are the methodologies that provide a more consistent description of these topological switches, while other methods, such as B3LYP, BPE, and BP86, show a biased description. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Two-State Reactivity of Histone Demethylases Containing Jumonji-C Active Sites: Different Mechanisms for Different Methylation Degrees.

The N-demethylation reactions of N,N,N-trimethylpropan-1-ammonium and N,N-dimethyl- and N-methylpropan-1-aminium cations in the presence of [(AcO)2 (imidazole)2 (H2 O)Fe=O] complex have been studied by density functional theory. These transformations are suitable models for the N-demethylation of tri-, di-, and monomethylated lysine residues of histones in the presence of Jumonji-C containing histone demethylases. It has been found that the N-demethylation reaction is stepwise and occurs on triplet and quintet potential energy hypersurfaces. Both spin states are nearly degenerated and the quantum jump from one state to another has a transition probability close to one. The preferred intrinsic mechanism depends upon the methylation degree. For trimethylated residues the mechanism consists of a proton abstraction from a methyl group followed by a formation of a hydroxymethylaminium intermediate. This mechanism also occurs when dimethylated residues are able to orientate one methyl group towards the Fe=O group of the catalytic site. In contrast, when a N-H group of the substrate is close enough to the Fe=O group, the intrinsically preferred N-demethylation reaction leads to the formation of an iminium intermediate that can be hydrolyzed to form the corresponding N-demethylated product.

Carbon Dioxide Capture and Release by Anions with Solvent-Dependent Behaviour: A Theoretical Study.

Recently, Clyburne and co-workers [Science, 2014, 344, 75-78] reported the novel synthesis of the elusive cyanoformate anion, NCCO2- . The stability of this anion is dependent on the dielectric constant of the local environment (polarity-switchable solvent): it is stable in low-polarity media and unstable in high-polarity solvents; hence, capturing and then releasing CO2 . The possibility of extending such behaviour to other anions is explored herein. Specifically, the CO2 capture process is studied for 26 anions in the gas phase and 3 distinct solvents (water, tetrahydrofuran, and toluene) by using the polarisable continuum model. Calculations are performed with the M06-2X and B3LYP-D3 density functionals and the aug-cc-pVTZ basis set. The design of new CO2 complexes with the anion, which can be formed or destroyed on demand by changing the solvent, is possible; the results for the alkoxylate and thiolate anions are especially promising. The nature of the substituents connected to the atom that bonds to CO2 in the anion is crucial in modulating the relative stability of the products-a key point for reversibility in the CO2 capture process. A moderate interaction for the anion-CO2 adduct-about 10 kcal mol-1 relative free energy with respect to the isolated reactants in the gas phase-and a relevant effect in the dielectric constant of the local environment are also key ingredients to achieve solvent dependency.

Microwave-Assisted Organocatalyzed Rearrangement of Propargyl Vinyl Ethers to Salicylaldehyde Derivatives: An Experimental and Theoretical Study.

The microwave-assisted imidazole-catalyzed transformation of propargyl vinyl ethers (PVEs) into multisubstituted salicylaldehydes is described. The reaction is instrumentally simple, scalable, and tolerates a diverse degree of substitution at the propargylic position of the starting PVE. The generated salicylaldehyde motifs incorporate a broad range of topologies, spanning from simple aromatic monocycles to complex fused polycyclic systems. The reaction is highly regioselective and takes place under symmetry-breaking conditions. The preparative power of this reaction was demonstrated in the first total synthesis of morintrifolin B, a benzophenone metabolite isolated from the small tree Morinda citrifolia L. A DFT study of the reaction was performed with full agreement between calculated values and experimental results. The theoretically calculated values support a domino mechanism comprising a propargyl Claisen rearrangement, a [1,3]-H shift, a [1,7]-H shift (enolization), a 6π electrocyclization, and an aromatization reaction.

Effect of the meso-substituent in the Hückel-to-Möbius topological switches.

Expanded porphyrins have emerged as a new promising class of molecules for the creation of new Hückel-to-Möbius topological switches with distinct aromaticities and magnetic and electric properties. In this work, we report a theoretical investigation of the conformational switch between the Hückel planar and the singly twisted Möbius structure for eight different meso-substituted [28]-hexaphyrins (with different steric effects and electron-withdrawing and -releasing character). Our results show how a change in the nature of the meso-substituent is able to turn an endothermic interconversion process with a high energy barrier into an exothermic and almost barrierless Hückel-Möbius transition. We also provide a thorough analysis of the main factors (aromaticity, intramolecular hydrogen bonds, ring strain, and steric effects) that play a role in this interconversion process. Overall, these results are very relevant to find new ways to control the thermochemistry and kinetics of these topological switches and even "freeze" the switch in the desired Möbius or Hückel conformation.

Carbon dioxide capture with the ozone-like polynitrogen molecule Li3N3.

In a very recent article (Chem.-Eur. J. 2014, 20, 6636), Olson et al. performed a theoretical study of the low-lying isomers of Li3N3 and found that two of the most stable structures show a novel N3(3-) molecular motif, which possesses structural and chemical bonding features similar to ozone. We explore a first application of these new Li3N3 species as a captor of carbon dioxide. Our results conclude that this is a very exothermic and exoergic process (the capture of one and two carbon dioxide molecules on Li3N3 releases, respectively, 42 and 70 kcal mol(-1) in relative free energy values evaluated at the CCSD(T)/aug-cc-pVTZ//B3LYP/aug-cc-pVTZ level of theory), which apparently occurs without any energy barrier but requires a nonlinear N3(3-) molecular motif.

Sulfuric acid as autocatalyst in the formation of sulfuric acid.

Sulfuric acid can act as a catalyst of its own formation. We have carried out a computational investigation on the gas-phase formation of H(2)SO(4) by hydrolysis of SO(3) involving one and two water molecules, and also in the presence of sulfuric acid and its complexes with one and two water molecules. The hydrolysis of SO(3) requires the concurrence of two water molecules, one of them acting as a catalyzer, and our results predict an important catalytic effect, ranging between 3 and 11 kcal·mol(-1) when the catalytic water molecule is substituted by a sulfuric acid molecule or one of its hydrates. In these cases, the reaction products are either bare sulfuric acid dimer or sulfuric acid dimer complexed with a water molecule. There are broad implications from these new findings. The results of the present investigation show that the catalytic effect of sulfuric acid in the SO(3) hydrolysis can be important in the Earth's stratosphere, in the heterogeneous formation of sulfuric acid and in the formation of aerosols, in H(2)SO(4) formation by aircraft engines, and also in understanding the formation of sulfuric acid in the atmosphere of Venus.

Is the HO4- anion a key species in the aqueous-phase decomposition of ozone?

The role of the HO(4)(-) anion in atmospheric chemistry and biology is a matter of debate, because it can be formed from, or be in equilibrium with, key species such as O(3) + HO(-) or HO(2) + O(2) (-). The determination of the stability of HO(4)(-) in water therefore has the greatest relevance for better understanding the mechanism associated with oxidative cascades in aqueous solution. However, experiments are difficult to perform because of the short-lived character of this species, and in this work we have employed DFT, CCSD(T) complete basis set (CBS), MRCI/aug-cc-pVTZ, and combined quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) calculations to investigate this topic. We show that the HO(4)(-) anion has a planar structure in the gas phase, with a very large HOO-OO bond length (1.823 Å). In contrast, HO(4)(-) adopts a nonplanar configuration in aqueous solution, with huge geometrical changes (up to 0.232 Å for the HOO-OO bond length) with a very small energy cost. The formation of the HO(4)(-) anion is predicted to be endergonic by 5.53±1.44 and 2.14±0.37 kcal mol(-1) with respect to the O(3) + HO(-) and HO(2) + O(2)(-) channels, respectively. Moreover, the combination of theoretical calculations with experimental free energies of solvation has allowed us to obtain accurate free energies for the main reactions involved in the aqueous decomposition of ozone. Thus, the oxygen transfer reaction (O(3) + OH(-) → HO(2) + O(2)(-)) is endergonic by 3.39±1.80 kcal mol(-1), the electron transfer process (O(3) + O(2)(-) → O(3)(-) + O(2)) is exergonic by 31.53±1.05 kcal mol(-1), supporting the chain-carrier role of the superoxide ion, and the reaction O(3) + HO(2)(-) → OH + O(2)(-) + O(2) is exergonic by 12.78±1.15 kcal mol(-1), which is consistent with the fact that the addition of small amounts of HO(2)(-) (through H(2)O(2)) accelerates ozone decomposition in water. The combination of our results with previously reported thermokinetic data provides some insights into the potentially important role of the HO(4)(-) anion as a key reaction intermediate.

Effects of a single water molecule on the OH + H2O2 reaction.

The effect of a single water molecule on the reaction between H(2)O(2) and HO has been investigated by employing MP2 and CCSD(T) theoretical approaches in connection with the aug-cc-PVDZ, aug-cc-PVTZ, and aug-cc-PVQZ basis sets and extrapolation to an ∞ basis set. The reaction without water has two elementary reaction paths that differ from each other in the orientation of the hydrogen atom of the hydroxyl radical moiety. Our computed rate constant, at 298 K, is 1.56 × 10(-12) cm(3) molecule(-1) s(-1), in excellent agreement with the suggested value by the NASA/JPL evaluation. The influence of water vapor has been investigated by considering either that H(2)O(2) first forms a complex with water that reacts with hydroxyl radical or that H(2)O(2) reacts with a previously formed H(2)O·OH complex. With the addition of water, the reaction mechanism becomes much more complex, yielding four different reaction paths. Two pathways do not undergo the oxidation reaction but an exchange reaction where there is an interchange between H(2)O(2)·H(2)O and H(2)O·OH complexes. The other two pathways oxidize H(2)O(2), with a computed total rate constant of 4.09 × 10(-12) cm(3) molecule(-1) s(-1) at 298 K, 2.6 times the value of the rate constant of the unassisted reaction. However, the true effect of water vapor requires taking into account the concentration of the prereactive bimolecular complex, namely, H(2)O(2)·H(2)O. With this consideration, water can actually slow down the oxidation of H(2)O(2) by OH between 1840 and 20.5 times in the 240-425 K temperature range. This is an example that demonstrates how water could be a catalyst in an atmospheric reaction in the laboratory but is slow under atmospheric conditions.

Evaluation of the nonlinear optical properties for an expanded porphyrin Hückel-Möbius aromaticity switch.

The conformational flexibility of the expanded porphyrins allows them to achieve different topologies with distinct aromaticities and nonlinear optical properties (NLOP). For instance, it is possible to switch between Möbius and Hückel topologies applying only small changes in the external conditions or in the structure of the ring. In this work, we evaluate the electronic and vibrational contributions to static and dynamic NLOP of the Hückel and Möbius conformers of A,D-di-p-benzi[28]hexaphyrin(1.1.1.1.1.1) synthesized by Latos-Grazynski and co-workers [Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 46, 7869 (2007)]. Calculations are performed at the HF, M052X, and CAM-B3LYP levels using the 6-31G, 6-311G(d), and 6-31+G(d) basis sets. Our results conclude that M052X∕6-31G and CAM-B3LYP/6-31G methods provide a correct qualitative description of the electronic and vibrational contributions for the NLOP of expanded porphyrins. The studied systems show high NLOP with large differences between the Möbius and Hückel conformations (around 1 × 10(6) a.u. for γ). The obtained results indicate that the expanded porphyrins are promising systems to manufacture Hückel-to-Möbius topological switches.

Protonation of water clusters induced by hydroperoxyl radical surface adsorption.

We have investigated the HO(2) adsorption and acid dissociation process on the surface of (H(2)O)(20) and (H(2)O)(21) clusters by using quantum-chemistry calculations. Our results show that the radical forms a stable hydrogen-bond complex on the cluster. The HO(2) acid dissociation is more favorable in the case of the (H(2)O)(21) cluster, for which the inner water molecule plays a crucial role. In fact, acid dissociation of HO(2) is found to occur in two steps. The first step involves H(2) O autoionization in the cluster, and the second one involves the proton transfer from the HO(2) radical to the hydroxide anion. The presence of the HO(2) radicals on the surface of the cluster facilitates water autoionization in the cluster.