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A clean and sustainable alternative to fossil fuels is solar energy. For efficient use of solar energy to be realized, artificial systems that can effectively capture and convert sunlight into a usable form of energy have to be developed. In natural photosynthesis, antenna chlorophylls and carotenoids capture sunlight and transfer

A clean and sustainable alternative to fossil fuels is solar energy. For efficient use of solar energy to be realized, artificial systems that can effectively capture and convert sunlight into a usable form of energy have to be developed. In natural photosynthesis, antenna chlorophylls and carotenoids capture sunlight and transfer the resulting excitation energy to the photosynthetic reaction center (PRC). Small reorganization energy, λ and well-balanced electronic coupling between donors and acceptors in the PRC favor formation of a highly efficient charge-separated (CS) state. By covalently linking electron/energy donors to acceptors, organic molecular dyads and triads that mimic natural photosynthesis were synthesized and studied. Peripherally linked free base phthalocyanine (Pc)-fullerene (C60) and a zinc (Zn) phthalocyanine-C60 dyads were synthesized. Photoexcitation of the Pc moiety resulted in singlet-singlet energy transfer to the attached C60, followed by electron transfer. The lifetime of the CS state was 94 ps. Linking C60 axially to silicon (Si) Pc, a lifetime of the CS state of 4.5 ns was realized. The exceptionally long-lived CS state of the SiPc-C60 dyad qualifies it for applications in solar energy conversion devices. A secondary electron donor was linked to the dyad to obtain a carotenoid (Car)-SiPc-C60 triad and ferrocene (Fc)-SiPc-C60 triad. Excitation of the SiPc moiety resulted in fast electron transfer from the Car or Fc secondary electron donors to the C60. The lifetime of the CS state was 17 ps and 1.2 ps in Car-SiPc-C60 and Fc-SiPc-C60, respectively. In Chapter 3, an efficient synthetic route that yielded regioselective oxidative porphyrin dimerization is presented. Using Cu2+ as the oxidant, meso-β doubly-connected fused porphyrin dimers were obtained in very high yields. Removal of the copper from the macrocycle affords a free base porphyrin dimer. This allows for exchange of metals and provides a route to a wider range of metallporphyrin dimers. In Chapter 4, the development of an efficient and an expedient route to bacteriopurpurin synthesis is discussed. Meso-10,20- diformylation of porphyrin was achieved and one-pot porphyrin diacrylate synthesis and cyclization to afford bacteriopurpurin was realized. The bacteriopurpurin had a reduction potential of - 0.85 V vs SCE and λmax, 845 nm.
ContributorsArero, Jaro (Author) / Gust, Devens (Thesis advisor) / Moore, Ana (Committee member) / Gould, Ian (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
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Description
Natural photosynthesis dedicates specific proteins to achieve the modular division of the essential roles of solar energy harvesting, charge separation and carrier transport within natural photosynthesis. The modern understanding of the fundamental photochemistry by which natural photosynthesis operates is well advanced and solution state mimics of the key photochemical processes

Natural photosynthesis dedicates specific proteins to achieve the modular division of the essential roles of solar energy harvesting, charge separation and carrier transport within natural photosynthesis. The modern understanding of the fundamental photochemistry by which natural photosynthesis operates is well advanced and solution state mimics of the key photochemical processes have been reported previously. All of the early events in natural photosynthesis responsible for the conversion of solar energy to electric potential energy occur within proteins and phospholipid membranes that act as scaffolds for arranging the active chromophores. Accordingly, for creating artificial photovoltaic (PV) systems, scaffolds are required to imbue structure to the systems. An approach to incorporating modular design into solid-state organic mimics of the natural system is presented together with how conductive scaffolds can be utilized in organic PV systems. To support the chromophore arrays present within this design and to extract separated charges from within the structure, linear pyrazine-containing molecular ribbons were chosen as candidates for forming conductive linear scaffolds that could be functionalized orthogonally to the linear axis. A series of donor-wire-acceptor (D-W-A) compounds employing porphyrins as the donors and a C60 fullerene adduct as the acceptors have been synthesized for studying the ability of the pyrazine-containing hetero-aromatic wires to mediate photoinduced electron transfer between the porphyrin donor and fullerene acceptor. Appropriate substitutions were made and the necessary model compounds useful for dissecting the complex photochemistry that the series is expected to display were also synthesized. A dye was synthesized using a pyrazine-containing heteroaromatic spacer that features two porphyrin chromophores. The dye dramatically outperforms the control dye featuring the same porphyrin and a simple benzoic acid linker. A novel, highly soluble 6+kDa extended phthalocyanine was also synthesized and exhibits absorption out to 900nm. The extensive functionalization of the extended phthalocyanine core with dodecyl groups enabled purification and characterization of an otherwise insoluble entity. Finally, in the interest of incorporating modular design into plastic solar cells, a series of porphyrin-containing monomers have been synthesized that are intended to form dyadic and triadic molecular-heterojunction polymers with dedicated hole and electron transport pathways during electrochemical polymerization.
ContributorsWatson, Brian Lyndon (Author) / Gust, Devens (Thesis advisor) / Gould, Ian (Committee member) / Moore, Ana L (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
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Description
The first chapter reviews three decades of artificial photosynthetic research conducted by the A. Moore, T. Moore, and D. Gust research group. Several carotenoid (Car) and tetrapyrrole containing molecules were synthesized and investigated for excitation energy transfer (EET), photoregulation, and photoprotective functions. These artificial photosynthetic compounds mimicked known processes and

The first chapter reviews three decades of artificial photosynthetic research conducted by the A. Moore, T. Moore, and D. Gust research group. Several carotenoid (Car) and tetrapyrrole containing molecules were synthesized and investigated for excitation energy transfer (EET), photoregulation, and photoprotective functions. These artificial photosynthetic compounds mimicked known processes and investigated proposed mechanisms in natural systems. This research leads to a greater understanding of photosynthesis and design concepts for organic based solar energy conversion devices. The second and third chapters analyze the triplet energy transfer in carotenoid containing dyads. Transient absorption, time-resolved FTIR and resonance Raman spectra revealed that in a 4-amide linked carotenophthalocyanine dyads the Car triplet state is shared across the larger conjugated system, which is similar to protein complexes in oxygenic photosynthetic organisms. In a carotenopurpurin dyad (CarPur) a methylene ester covalent bond prevents the purpurin (Pur) from influencing the Car triplet based on the transient absorption, time-resolved FTIR and resonance Raman spectra. Thus CarPur resembles the antenna proteins from anoxygenic photosynthetic bacteria. Additional examples of carotenoporphyrin dyads further demonstrates the need for orbital overlap for ultrafast triplet energy transfer and the formations of possible intramolecular charge transfer state. The fourth chapter studies a 4-amino phenyl carotenophthalocyanine and its model compounds using high temporal resolution transient absorption spectroscopy techniques. EET from the Car second excited (S2) state to the phthalocyanine (Pc) was determined to be 37% and a coupled hot ground state (S*)/Pc excited state spectrum was observed. Excitation of the tetrapyrrole portion of the dyad did not yield any kinetic differences, but there was an S* signal during the excited states of the dyad. This demonstrates the EET and photoregulating properties of this artificial photosynthetic compound are similar to those of natural photosynthesis. The last chapter covers the synthesis of silicon Pc (SiPc) dyes and the methods for attaching them to gold nanoparticles and flat gold surfaces. SiPc attached to patterned gold surfaces had unperturbed fluorescence, however the selectivity for the gold was low, so alternative materials are under investigation to improve the dye's selectivity for the gold surface.
ContributorsWongCarter, Katherine (Author) / Moore, Ana L (Thesis advisor) / Gust, Devens (Committee member) / Gould, Ian (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
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Description
The growing use of Learning Management Systems (LMS) in classrooms has enabled a great amount of data to be collected about the study behavior of students. Previously, research has been conducted to interpret the collected LMS usage data in order to find the most effective study habits for students. Professors

The growing use of Learning Management Systems (LMS) in classrooms has enabled a great amount of data to be collected about the study behavior of students. Previously, research has been conducted to interpret the collected LMS usage data in order to find the most effective study habits for students. Professors can then use the interpretations to predict which students will perform well and which student will perform poorly in the rest of the course, allowing the professor to better provide assistance to students in need. However, these research attempts have largely analyzed metrics that are specific to certain graphical interfaces, ways of answering questions, or specific pages on an LMS. As a result, the analysis is only relevant to classrooms that use the specific LMS being analyzed.

For this thesis, behavior metrics obtained by the Organic Practice Environment (OPE) LMS at Arizona State University were compared to student performance in Dr. Ian Gould’s Organic Chemistry I course. Each metric gathered was generic enough to be potentially used by any LMS, allowing the results to be relevant to a larger amount of classrooms. By using a combination of bivariate correlation analysis, group mean comparisons, linear regression model generation, and outlier analysis, the metrics that correlate best to exam performance were identified. The results indicate that the total usage of the LMS, amount of cramming done before exams, correctness of the responses submitted, and duration of the responses submitted all demonstrate a strong correlation with exam scores.
ContributorsBeerman, Eric (Author) / VanLehn, Kurt (Thesis advisor) / Gould, Ian (Committee member) / Hsiao, Ihan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
Due to its difficult nature, organic chemistry is receiving much research attention across the nation to develop more efficient and effective means to teach it. As part of that, Dr. Ian Gould at ASU is developing an online organic chemistry educational website that provides help to students, adapts to their

Due to its difficult nature, organic chemistry is receiving much research attention across the nation to develop more efficient and effective means to teach it. As part of that, Dr. Ian Gould at ASU is developing an online organic chemistry educational website that provides help to students, adapts to their responses, and collects data about their performance. This thesis creative project addresses the design and implementation of an input parser for organic chemistry reagent questions, to appear on his website. After students used the form to submit questions throughout the Spring 2013 semester in Dr. Gould's organic chemistry class, the data gathered from their usage was analyzed, and feedback was collected. The feedback obtained from students was positive, and suggested that the input parser accomplished the educational goals that it sought to meet.
ContributorsBeerman, Eric Christopher (Author) / Gould, Ian (Thesis director) / Wilkerson, Kelly (Committee member) / Mosca, Vince (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Computer Science and Engineering Program (Contributor)
Created2013-05