Valence tautomerism and macrocycle ruffling in nickel(III) porphyrins

Nonlocal density functional calculations with full geometry optimization have been carried out on the low-lying electronic states of oxidized nickel porphyrins. For [NiIII(P)(Py)2]+, the ground state corresponds to a t2g6(z2)1 configuration and the t2g6(x2-y2)1 configuration is 0.43 eV higher in energy. In contrast, the ground state of [NiIII(P)(CN)2]- corresponds to a t2g6(x2-y2)1 configuration, the t2g6(z2)1 configuration being 0.96 eV higher in energy. The results are consistent with EPR spectroscopic results on the TPP analogs of these complexes. For [Ni(P)(Py)2]+, the a2u- and a1u-type Ni(II) porphyrin cation radical states are higher in energy by 0.63 and 1.23 eV, respectively, relative to the t2g6(z2)1 Ni(III) ground state. The Ni-N(Porphyrin) distance is significantly shorter in [NiIII(P)(Py)2]+ (196 pm) than in [NiIII(P)(CN)2]- (206 pm), which is consistent with the ruffled and planar macrocycle conformations, respectively, in the two complexes.