Three-Chromophore Excited-State Mixed Valence

The lowest energy optical electronic absorption band of the three-chromophore system tris(4-bromophenyl)amine radical cation is analyzed. The lowest energy electronic transition corresponds to a p-bromophenyl orbital to nitrogen p orbital transition that places the positive charge on three equivalent p-bromophenyl chromophores. The excited electronic state is an example of excited-state mixed valence (ESMV), and the spectrum is interpreted using two ESMV models. The simplest model invokes the concept of an “effective coupling” between the three identical chromophores with an excited-state energy splitting equal to three times the coupling. A more accurate model, the “neighboring orbital model”, utilizes the coupling between the bridge’s and charge-bearing unit’s orbitals closest in energy. The three-chromophore system provides a striking illustration of the failure of an effective coupling term to account for ESMV splitting. The calculated relative energies of the diabatic and adiabatic states are different, but the calculated absorption spectra of the two models show nearly identical vibrational fine structure. Resonance Raman data and the time-dependent theory of electronic and resonance Raman spectroscopies are used to calculate the spectra.