Disrupting the Photochemical Landscape of a β-Diketone via Electrostatic Perturbation of Ground-State Tautomers.

ABSTRACT: Photochemically triggered control of keto-enol equilibria is of growing importance in rational synthetic strategies. Questions exist, however, about the extent to which the electrostatic effects (i.e., interactions with counterions and solvent) can perturb or direct such photocatalytic approaches. Here, we directly address the question of whether electrostatic tuning via alkali metal binding can affect the photochemistry of the classic β-diketone molecule, avobenzone, which exists in keto and enol forms. A combination of photodissociation mass spectrometry over the ultraviolet (UV) (390-238 nm) and infrared (IR) (800-1800 cm^-1) ranges and quantum chemical calculations (density functional theory (DFT) and SCS-ADC(2)) is applied to isolated (gas-phase) alkali metal-avobenzone comp

SUBMITTER: Anstoter CS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12715789 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature