Design and Mechanism of Rare-Earth Singlet Oxygen Sensing: An Experimental and Quantum Chemical Approach

The sensitive detection of singlet oxygen (¹O₂) is one key issue in various photochemical analyses, reactions, and processes; it is indispensable for designing catalysts for photodynamic therapies. Corresponding fluorescence-based organic ¹O₂ monitor luminophores may be equipped with rare-earth complexes with several intrinsic advantages. The design of the necessary ligands being a tedious, time-consuming effort, often involving empirical guesswork, we decided to support our experimental work with quantum chemical calculations. Hence, next to the experimental core, this paper suggests the additional use of time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT) on suitable, free β-diketonate ligands to devise corresponding Eu³⁺ complexes as ¹O₂ probes eventually; the free ligand calculations obviously allow profoundly reduced computational efforts. Novel β-diketonate-substituted dimethyl anthracene complexes of Eu³⁺, Tb³⁺, and Gd³⁺ and their endoperoxidized descendants were thus synthesized, compared to known related complexes and analyzed with regard to their electronic characteristics; in addition, spectroscopy of a Eu³⁺ complex with ancillary epoxiphenanthroline for subsequent attachment to biological substrates featuring -NH₂ or -SH groups was included. The spectroscopic determination of the decisive lowest triplet (T₁) states of the Gd complexes could be matched by the Tamm-Dancoff approximation (TDA)/TDDFT calculations on the free ligands satisfactorily if suitable functionals were applied. Most significantly, the results suffice to describe the luminescence "switch-on" mechanism of this complex in the presence of ¹O₂.