Purple acid phosphatases (PAPs) are a group of metallohydrolases that contain a dinuclear Fe III M II center (M II = Fe, Mn, Zn) in the active site and are able to catalyze the hydrolysis of a variety of phosphoric acid esters. The dinuclearhas recently been prepared and is found to closely mimic the coordination environment of the Fe III Zn II active site found in red kidney bean PAP (Neves et al. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2007, 129, 7486). The biomimetic shows significant catalytic activity in hydrolytic reactions. By using a variety of structural, spectroscopic, and computational techniques the electronic structure of the Fe III center of this biomimetic complex was determined. In the solid state the electronic ground state reflects the rhombically distorted Fe III N 2 O 4 octahedron with a dominant tetragonal compression aligned along the μ-OH-Fe-O phenolate direction. To probe the role of the Fe-O phenolate bond, the phenolate moiety was modified to contain electron-donating or -withdrawing groups (-CH 3 , -H, -Br, -NO 2 ) in the 5-position. The effects of the substituents on the electronic properties of the biomimetic complexes were studied with a range of experimental and computational techniques. This study establishes benchmarks against accurate crystallographic structural information using spectroscopic techniques that are not restricted to single crystals. Kinetic studies on the hydrolysis reaction revealed that the phosphodiesterase activity increases in the order -NO 2 rBr rH rCH 3 when 2,4-bis(dinitrophenyl)phosphate (2,4-bdnpp) was used as substrate, and a linear free energy relationship is found when log(k cat /k 0 ) is plotted against the Hammett parameter σ. However, nuclease activity measurements in the cleavage of double stranded DNA showed that the complexes containing the electron-withdrawing -NO 2 and electron-donating -CH 3 groups are the most active while the cytotoxic activity of the biomimetics on leukemia and lung tumoral cells is highest for complexes with electron-donating groups.

Presented herein is the synthesis and characterization of a new Fe(III)Zn(II) complex containing a Fe(III)-bound phenolate with a carbonyl functional group, which was anchored to 3-aminopropyl-functionalized silica as the solid support. The catalytic efficiency of the immobilized catalyst in the hydrolysis of 2,4-bis(dinitrophenyl)phosphate is comparable to the homogeneous reaction, and the supported catalyst can be reused for subsequent diester hydrolysis reactions.

As metal ions are present in the catalytic sites of several enzymes, attention has been focused on the synthesis and characterization of metal complexes able to act as biomimetic functional and structural models for these systems. In this study, a novel dinuclear NiII complex was synthesized, [Ni2(L2)(OAc)2(CH3CN)]BPh4 (2) (HL2=2-[N-(2-(pyridyl-2-yl)ethyl)(1-methylimidazol-2-yl)amin omethyl]-4-methyl-6-[N-(2-(imidazol-4-yl)ethyl)amino methyl]phenol), employing a new unsymmetrical dinucleating ligand containing N,O-donor groups as a model for hydrolases. Complex 2 was characterized by a variety of techniques including: elemental analysis, infrared and UV-vis spectroscopies, molar conductivity, electrochemistry, potentiometric titration, magnetochemistry, and single-crystal X-ray diffractometry. The structural and magnetochemical data of 2 allow us to consider this complex as a structural model for the active site of the ureases, as previously reported for [Ni2(L1)(OAc)2(H2O)]ClO4.H2O (1) (HL1=2-[N-bis-(2-pyridylmethyl)aminomethyl]-4-methyl-6-[N-(2-pyridylmethyl)aminomethyl] phenol). The characterization of complexes 1 and 2 (mainly by X-ray diffraction and potentiometric titration) led us to study their reactivities toward the hydrolysis of the substrate bis(2,4-dinitrophenyl)phosphate (2,4-BDNPP). These studies revealed that complexes 1 and 2 show the best catalytic activity reported so far, with acceleration rates 8.8x10(4) and 9.95x10(5) times faster, respectively, than the uncatalyzed hydrolysis of 2,4-BDNPP. Catalytic activity of 2 on 2,4-DNPP showed that the monoester is hydrolyzed 27 times slower than the 2,4-BDNPP diester under identical experimental conditions. Therefore, 1 and 2 can undoubtedly be considered highly efficient functional models of the phosphohydrolases.

A mixed-valence complex, [Fe(III)Fe(II)L1(μ-OAc)(2)]BF(4)·H(2)O, where the ligand H(2)L1 = 2-{[[3-[((bis(pyridin-2-ylmethyl)amino)methyl)-2-hydroxy-5-methylbenzyl](pyridin-2-ylmethyl)amino]methyl]phenol}, has been studied with a range of techniques, and, where possible, its properties have been compared to those of the corresponding enzyme system purple acid phosphatase. The Fe(III)Fe(II) and Fe(III)(2) oxidized species were studied spectroelectrochemically. The temperature-dependent population of the S = 3/2 spin states of the heterovalent system, observed using magnetic circular dichroism, confirmed that the dinuclear center is weakly antiferromagnetically coupled (H = -2JS(1)·S(2), where J = -5.6 cm(-1)) in a frozen solution. The ligand-to-metal charge-transfer transitions are correlated with density functional theory calculations. The Fe(III)Fe(II) complex is electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR)-silent, except at very low temperatures (<2 K), because of the broadening caused by the exchange coupling and zero-field-splitting parameters being of comparable magnitude and rapid spin-lattice relaxation. However, a phosphate-bound Fe(III)(2) complex showed an EPR spectrum due to population of the S(tot) = 3 state (J= -3.5 cm(-1)). The phosphatase activity of the Fe(III)Fe(II) complex in hydrolysis of bis(2,4-dinitrophenyl)phosphate (k(cat.) = 1.88 × 10(-3) s(-1); K(m) = 4.63 × 10(-3) mol L(-1)) is similar to that of other bimetallic heterovalent complexes with the same ligand. Analysis of the kinetic data supports a mechanism where the initiating nucleophile in the phosphatase reaction is a hydroxide, terminally bound to Fe(III). It is interesting to note that aqueous solutions of [Fe(III)Fe(II)L1(μ-OAc)(2)](+) are also capable of protein cleavage, at mild temperature and pH conditions, thus further expanding the scope of this complex's catalytic promiscuity.