DFT/TDDFT STUDY ON DNA-BINDING AND SPECTRAL PROPERTIES OF "LIGHT SWITCH" COMPLEX [Ru(phen)2 (taptp)]2+ IN AQUEOUS SOLUTION

The theoretical studies on the electronic structure, DNA-binding, and absorption-spectral properties of "light switch" complex [ Ru ( phen )2( taptp )]2+ (phen = 1,10-phenanthroline; taptp = 4,5,9,18-tetraazaphenanthreno-[9,10-b]triphenylene) in aqueous solution have been carried out using density functional theory (DFT) and time-dependent DFT (TDDFT) methods. The results show the following: (i) The solvent effect makes all the frontier molecular orbital energies of complex to increase to a certain extent; however, the energies (ε LUMO + x) of some frontier unoccupied molecular orbitals (MOs) in aqueous solution are still negative and rather lower than those of the energies (ε HOMO - x) of some frontier-occupied MOs of DNA-base pairs, and thus the complex in aqueous solution is still an excellent electron-acceptor in its DNA-binding. (ii) The solvent effect further shows that simply increasing the conjugative planar area of intercalative ligand may be ineffective on the improvement of DNA-binding of the resulting complex because of going along with the increase in the LUMO (and LUMO + x) energy. It is the reason why the DNA-binding affinity of "light switch" complex [ Ru ( phen )2( taptp )]2+ is not better than that of the well-known complex [ Ru ( phen )2( dppz )]2+ yet. (iii) The three main experimental bands (~450 nm, ~360 nm, and ~290 nm) of the studied complex in aqueous solution were further well calculated, simulated, and explained by the TDDFT computations.