Studies of potential inversion in an extended tetrathiafulvalene

Electrochemical oxidation of the extended tetrathiafulvalene 9,10-bis(1,3-dithiole-2-ylidene)-9,10-dihydroanthracene (2) was studied in N,N-dimethylformamide. A single, two-electron oxidation peak occurs, and on the return sweep of a cyclic voltammogram, a two-electron reduction peak is seen. The oxidation of 2 to its cation radical and dication occurs with potential inversion (i.e., removal of the second electron occurs more easily than removal of the first). The extent of potential inversion was estimated by cyclic voltammetry to be 0.28 V by analysis of the process in terms of concerted structural change and electron transfer. Failure to detect the cation radical by EPR of an equimolar mixture of neutral 2 and the dication is consistent with this value. The inner reorganization energy of the cation radical was determined by gas-phase photoelectron spectroscopy (PES) to be 0.31-0.35 eV. Calculations, consistent with earlier experimental data, show rather large changes in structure associated with the oxidation processes. These large structural changes contrast with the relatively small inner reorganization energy found by PES. This observation prompted an analysis of voltammetry in terms of two-step processes, with structural change either preceding or following electron transfer. Agreement of simulations based on this mechanism with experimental voltammograms was equally as good as with the concerted mechanism. Notably, the two-step mechanism produced more realistic values of the transfer coefficient and electron-transfer rate constant for the first step of oxidation.