Mechanism of Formation of Copper(II) Chloro Complexes Revealed by Transient Absorption Spectroscopy and DFT/TDDFT Calculations.

Copper(II) complexes are extremely labile with typical ligand exchange rate constants on the order of 10(6)-10(9) M(-1) s(-1). As a result, it is often difficult to identify the actual formation mechanism of these complexes. In this work, using UV-vis transient absorption when probing in a broad time range (20 ps to 8 μs) in conjunction with DFT/TDDFT calculations, we studied the dynamics and underlying reaction mechanisms of the formation of extremely labile copper(II) CuCl4(2-) chloro complexes from copper(II) CuCl3(-) trichloro complexes and chloride ions. These two species, produced via photochemical dissociation of CuCl4(2-) upon 420 nm excitation into the ligand-to-metal-charge-transfer electronic state, are found to recombine into parent complexes with bimolecular rate constants of (9.0 ± 0.1) × 10(7) and (5.3 ± 0.4) × 10(8) M(-1) s(-1) in acetonitrile and dichloromethane, respectively. In dichloromethane, recombination occurs via a simple one-step addition. In acetonitrile, where [CuCl3](-) reacts with the solvent to form a [CuCl3CH3CN](-) complex in less than 20 ps, recombination takes place via ligand exchange described by the associative interchange mechanism that involves a [CuCl4CH3CN](2-) intermediate. In both solvents, the recombination reaction is potential energy controlled.