Phosphine-substituted porphyrins as supramolecular building blocks

Abstract

A route to alkyne-phosphine-substituted metalloporphyrins is presented. The X-ray structure of the methanol adduct of a diphenylphosphine Zn(II) porphyrin reveals solid state dimerisation accompanied by proton transfer from coordinated methanol to phosphine in a process reminiscent of carbonic anhydrase. The ability of the phosphine-substituted porphyrins to form non-covalent arrays with a Ru(II) porphyrin was explored using 1H/31P NMR and UV/vis spectroscopy as well as MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry.