Mesolytic scission of C-C bonds as a probe for photoinduced electron transfer reactions of Quinones

Photoinduced electron transfer reactions of chlorinated benzoquinones are investigated using bibenzylic donors that undergo rapid fragmentation upon oxidation. The fragmentation rates and the quantum yields are used to probe the dynamics of back-electron transfer (BET) in two types of radical ion pairs. The triplet ion pairs formed by interception of excited state quinones give products with high quantum yields. The singlet ion pairs formed by irradiation of the charge-transfer (CT) complexes between the quinones and the donors undergo reactions with significantly lower efficiency. The advantage of the first method (triplet quenching) over the CT-irradiation depends on the energetics of BET. It is large for reactions with relatively small ΔG_et for BET and it decreases for reactions with more negative ΔG_bet. The indirectly obtained rates of BET are in excellent agreement with literature data for similar, but unreactive systems, and the rates of C-C bond scission in radical cations generated in these systems are consistent with the thermodynamics of these processes.