Mechanisms of bridge-mediated electron transfer: a TDDFT electronic dynamics study

We present a time-dependent density functional theory approach for probing the dynamics of electron transfer on a donor-bridge-acceptor polyene dye scaffold. Two kinds of mechanisms, namely, the superexchange mechanism and the sequential mechanism, may be involved in the electron transfer process. In this work, we have focused on the crossover between these two charge transfer mechanisms on a series of donor-bridge-acceptor polyene dye systems with varying lengths of conjugated bridges. A number of methods and quantities are used to assist in the analysis, including the phase relationship of charge evolution and frequency domain spectra of the time-dependent dipole. Our simulations show that the superexchange mechanism plays a dominant role in the electron transfer from donor to acceptor when the bridge length is small, and the sequential mechanism becomes more important as the polyene bridge is lengthened. Full Ehrenfest dynamics with nuclear motion show that molecular vibrations play a very small role in such ultrafast charge transfer processes.