Electroabsorption Studies of Metal-to-Ligand Charge Transfer in Ru(phenanthroline)(3)(2+): Evidence for Intrinsic Charge Localization in the Initially Formed Excited State.

Electroabsorption studies of ruthenium(II) tris(phenanthroline) show that a substantial change in dipole moment (|Delta&mgr;| = 6.7 +/- 1 D) accompanies ground state to "singlet" metal-to-ligand charge transfer (MLCT) excited-state formation. The change is nearly identical to that reported for the 2,2'-bipyridine analogue (Oh; et al.