Design of nanometer scale artificial light harvesting and charge separating proteins enables reengineering to overcome the limitations of natural selection for efficient systems that better meet human energetic needs.

The incorporation of amphiphilic tetrapyrrole macrocycles in organized media is of great value for a variety of fundamental photochemical studies, yet work to date has chiefly employed porphyrins rather than chlorins or bacteriochlorins. The latter absorb strongly in the red or near-infrared spectral region, respectively. Here, eight amphiphilic macrocycles (six chlorins and two bacteriochlorins) have been designed, synthesized and characterized; the compounds differ in long wavelength absorption (610-745 nm) and peripheral substituents (type of auxochrome, hydrophobic/hydrophilic groups). A methyl pyridinium or benzoic acid substituent at the 15-position provides a polar "tail" whereas a hydrophobic group distal thereto (in the chlorins) provides a lipophilic "head" for the spontaneous incorporation in organized media. The eight (bacterio)chlorins are characterized by static and time-resolved absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy in N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF) and three micellar environments (TX-100, CTAB, and SDS) as well as ultrafast transient absorption studies in DMF. In most cases, a long-lived excited singlet state was observed [free base chlorins (F f ¼ 0.14-0.20; s S ¼ 7.9-12.1 ns; F isc ¼ 0.5), zinc chlorins (F f ¼ 0.08-0.19; s S ¼ 2.0-3.4 ns; F isc ¼ 0.6-0.8) and free base bacteriochlorins (F f ¼ 0.06-0.16; s S ¼ 1.8-4.6 ns; F isc ¼ 0.4)]. In the case of bacteriochlorins, minimal medium dependence was observed whereas changing the hydrophilic group from methyl pyridinium to benzoic acid increases the fluorescence yield and excited-state lifetime by 50%. In the case of chlorins, the zinc chelate with methyl pyridinium substitution exhibits substantial environmental dependence due to interaction of the solvent with the methyl pyridinium group and the central zinc metal. Collectively, the studies provide valuable information for the design of red or near-infrared absorbing chromophores for incorporation into amphiphilic environments such as micelles, membranes, or proteins.

The presence of substituents at designated sites about the chlorin macrocycle can alter the spectral properties, a phenomenon that can be probed through synthesis. Prior syntheses have provided access to chlorins bearing distinct aryl substituents (individually or collectively) at the 5, 10, and 15-positions, but not the 20-position. A new Western half (5-phenyl-2,3,4,5-tetrahydro-1,3,3-trimethyldipyrrin) has been employed in condensation with an Eastern half (9-bromodipyrromethane-1-carboxaldehyde) followed by oxidative cyclization to give (5% yield) the zinc(II) 20-phenylchlorin. Condensation of the same Western half and a diaryl-substituted Eastern half provided (11% yield) the zinc(II) 5,10,20-triarylchlorin; demetalation with TFA followed by 15-bromination and Suzuki coupling gave the free base 5,10,15,20-tetraarylchlorin. Altogether, 10 new synthetic chlorins have been prepared. The near-UV (B) absorption band of the free base chlorins shifts bathochromically from 389 to 429 nm and that for the zinc chlorins from 398 to 420 nm as the number of meso-aryl rings is increased stepwise from 0-4. The long-wavelength (Q(y)) absorption band undergoes a bathochromic and hypochromic shift upon increase in number of meso-aryl groups. Regardless of the number and positions of the meso-aryl substituents (including "walking a phenyl group around the ring"), the respective fluorescence quantum yields (0.17 to 0.27) and singlet excited-state lifetimes (9.4 to 13.1 ns) are comparable among the free base chlorins and the same is true for the zinc chelates (0.057 to 0.080; 1.2 to 1.6 ns). Density functional theory calculations show that of the frontier molecular orbitals of the chlorin, the energy of the HOMO-1 is the most affected by meso-aryl substituents, undergoing progressive destabilization as the number of meso-aryl groups is increased. The availability of chlorins with 0-4 distinct meso-aryl substituents provides the individual stepping-stones to bridge the known unsubstituted chlorin and the meso-tetraarylchlorins.

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