CAS: ENFORCING EXCITED STATE REACTIVITY BY ALTERING CHROMOPHORE CHARACTERISTICS

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With this award, the Chemical Structure, Dynamics and Mechanism-B program in the Division of Chemistry supports the fundamental research of Professor Jayaraman Sivaguru and his students at Bowling Green State University (BGSU) in Ohio. The Sivaguru group harnesses the power of light to create sustainable strategies for carrying out new chemical transformations. They develop new models to understand the fundamental aspects and to control light–induced reactivity. The overarching goal is to build complex molecular structures in an energy efficient and sustainable fashion. This project integrates the research and academic goals of teaching and learning to help students gain experimental and intellectual competence. The broader impacts of the program include research by high school students in northwest Ohio through an outreach program called PICNICS (Parents Involvement with Children, Nurturing Intellectual Curiosity in Science). This program provides summer internships for local high school juniors and seniors. This enables the students to learn first-hand about recent advancements in science, and to gain experience working in a cutting-edge research environment in BGSU’s Center for Photochemical Sciences.The research plan develops strategies for directing excited state reactivity, uncovering new photochemical reactivity, and achieving reaction selectivity by altering the normal characteristics of chromophores. The electronic characteristics of reactive chromophores are modified either by internal substitution or through external additives such as Lewis acids. This work is designed to reveal new photochemical pathways and reactivity that are not observed in conventional systems. The research seeks to understand the delicate balance between reactivity, selectivity, dynamics, and lifetimes of molecular excited state and short-lived intermediates. One goal is to create new paradigms related to photochemical and photophysical events using altered chromophore characteristics. The outcome of the proposed investigations provides a platform to build complex molecules with pre-defined configurations, in an energy efficient and sustainable fashion. The results have a significant impact on basic concepts related to the photosciences and broadly influence the fields of synthesis, materials science, organic optoelectronics, catalysis and environmental science. This research provides opportunities for student training and integration of research in public outreach programs.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.