A density functional study was performed to investigate
the mechanism
of the photocatalytic reactivity of styrene polymerization using dinuclear
Ru–Pd and Ir–Pd catalytic complexes. In previous experiments
with these catalysts, the reactivity increased, and more polymer products
were yielded compared to dimers under visible light irradiation. The
best catalytic reactivity was obtained using an Ir–Pd complex
containing naphthyl substituents at the phenyl ligands coordinated
to Ir (Ir–Pd1). In contrast, Ir–Pd2, an isomer of Ir–Pd1, containing naphthyl substituents at the pyridine ligands,
did not show good reactivity, which may be related to the stability
of the excited state of the catalytic complexes. In this study, we
calculated the radiative lifetimes of these catalytic complexes and Ir–Pd1 had the longest lifetime; this result was consistent
with the experimental results. The longest lifetime of the Ir–Pd1 was attributed to the destabilization of
the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) energy by π*−π*
interactions between the naphthyl and phenyl ligands. Further, this
destabilization of the HOMO energy afforded a small energy gap between
the HOMO and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital, enhancing the metal-to-ligand
charge transfer to the bridging ligand between Ir and Pd. Additionally,
we focused on the reaction of the second insertion of styrene, which
was identified as the rate-determining step of the polymerization
cycle in a previous study. The singlet–triplet crossing points
of the intermediates were estimated, and the barrier heights of the
intersystem crossing were much lower than those in the thermal paths,
which explained the efficiency of the photocatalytic reactivity in
the experiment.