Photochemistry of dithiocarbamate Cu(II) complex in CCl4.

Laser pulse photolysis was used to study the nature and reactions of intermediates in the photochemistry of the flat dithiocarbamate complex Cu(Et(2)dtc)(2) in CCl(4). A nanosecond laser pulse (355 nm) is shown to induce intermediate absorption bands of bivalent copper complex whose coordination sphere contains a dithiocarbamate radical Et(2)dtc(•) and a chloride ion at the axial position ([(Et(2)dtc)Cu(Et(2)dtc(•))Cl(a)]). At room temperature during some microseconds after the laser pulse, this intermediate interacts with the initial complex to form presumably a dimer [Cu(2)(Et(2)dtc)(3)(Et(2)dtc(•))Cl]. The latter vanishes in the second-order reaction. Analysis of kinetic and spectral features gives the arguments for the formation of a cluster [Cu(2)(Et(2)dtc)(3)Cl-tds-Cu(2)(Et(2)dtc)(3)Cl], which produces a new absorption band at 345 nm. The cluster decomposes in ∼5 ms into final products, a binuclear complex [Cu(2)(Et(2)dtc)(3)Cl] and tetraethylthiuramdisulfide (Et(4)tds).