“…4) involves CO 2 coordination to one of the Cu II centers, nucleophilic attack of a hydroxido group, coordinated to the other Cu II center, at the CO 2 carbon atom, leading to a bridging HCO 3 − anion, and release of HCO 3 − to reform the catalytically active hydroxidodicopper(II)-patellamide complex [the important forms of the complexes (unbridged, hydroxido-bridged, carbonato-bridged) have been thoroughly characterized by electrospray massspectrometry (ESI-MS), UV-vis-NIR, CD, EPR spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, 13 C and 18 O labeling studies and computational methods) ‡ and preliminary conformational analyses (Monte Carlo and molecular dynamics simulations) support the release of the bridging carbonate]. 13,14 The maximum rate with Tris as the base ( pK a = 8.07, 10 5 -fold acceleration) and relatively small rates at lower pH (3,5-lutidine pK a = 6.21, uncatalyzed; imidazole pK a = 7.14, 10 3 -fold acceleration) indicate that the pK a value of the a In addition to the usual fixed parameters for fitting kinetic data of CO 2 hydration, the pK a value of Cu II -coordinated water (see Schemes 2 and 3, K H ; pK a [Cu II (H 2 O) 6 ] 2+ = 7.50) 48 and the association constant of CO 2 with the catalyst (see Scheme 2, log K Cat = 4) 36,47,60 were estimated from published data (standard deviations given in brackets). Cu II -coordinated OH 2 molecule, responsible for a maximum concentration of the catalytically active hydroxido complex, is 7.1 < pK a < 8.1, and this is as expected for Cu II aqua ions 48 and the assumed pK a values of the two coordinated water molecules in our complexes in H 2 O-MeCN as solvent ( pK a = 6.8 and 7.5), based on the analysis of the phosphoester hydrolysis kinetics.…”