Long-Lived Charge Separation with High Qauntum Yield in a Ferrocene-Porphyrin-Fullerene Triad

A ferrocene-porphyrin-C60 triad was prepared to mimic efficient photosynthetic multistep electron transfer system. Upon irradiation, the triad produced a long-lived charge-separated state with a high quantum yield, compared with the previously reported artificial photosynthetic triads. The lifetime of the charge separated state increased with increasing the solvent polarity. These results indicate that C60 is an excellent building block as an acceptor in light energy conversion systems.