Iron(III) Carbene Complexes with Tunable Excited State Energies for Photoredox and Upconversion

Substituting precious elements in luminophores and photocatalysts by abundant first-row transition metals remains a significant challenge, and iron continues to be particularly attractive owing to its high natural abundance and low cost. Most iron complexes known to date face severe limitations due to undesirably efficient deactivation of luminescent and photoredox-active excited states. Two new iron(III) complexes with structurally simple chelate ligands enable straightforward tuning of ground and excited state properties, contrasting recent examples, in which chemical modification had a minor impact. Crude samples feature two luminescence bands strongly reminiscent of a recent iron(III) complex, in which this observation was attributed to dual luminescence, but in our case, there is clear-cut evidence that the higher-energy luminescence stems from an impurity and only the red photoluminescence from a doublet ligand-to-metal charge transfer (2LMCT) excited state is genuine. Photoinduced oxidative and reductive electron transfer reactions with methyl viologen and 10-methylphenothiazine occur with nearly diffusion-limited kinetics. Photocatalytic reactions not previously reported for this compound class, in particular the C–H arylation of diazonium salts and the aerobic hydroxylation of boronic acids, were achieved with low-energy red light excitation. Doublet–triplet energy transfer (DTET) from the luminescent 2LMCT state to an anthracene annihilator permits the proof of principle for triplet–triplet annihilation upconversion based on a molecular iron photosensitizer. These findings are relevant for the development of iron complexes featuring photophysical and photochemical properties competitive with noble-metal-based compounds.