This book covers the various processes of charge transfer in physics, chemistry and biology and shows the similarities and differences between them. It focuses on the physical mechanisms of the elementary processes to demonstrate their common physical nature.

Charge migration through DNA has been the focus of considerable interest in recent years. This book presents contributions from an international team of researchers active in this field. It contains a wide range of topics that includes the mathematical background of the quantum processes involved, the role of charge transfer in DNA radiation damage, a new approach to DNA sequencing, DNA photonics, and many others.

an integrated approach to electron transfer phenomena This two-part stand-alone volume in the prestigious Advances in Chemical Physics series provides the most comprehensive overview of electron transfer science today. It draws on cutting-edge research from diverse areas of chemistry, physics, and biology-covering the most recent developments in the field, and pointing to important future trends. This initial volume includes: * A historical perspective spanning five decades * A review of concepts, problems, and ideas in current research * Electron transfer in isolated molecules and in clusters * General theory, including useful algorithms * Spectra and electron transfer kinetics in bridged compounds The second volume covers solvent control, ultrafast electron transfer and coherence effects, molecular electronics, electron transfer and chemistry, and biomolecules. Electron transfer science has seen tremendous progress in recent years. Technological innovations, most notably the advent of femtosecond lasers, now permit the real-time investigation of intramolecular and intermolecular electron transfer processes on a time scale of nuclear motion. New scientific information abounds, illuminating the processes of energy acquisition, storage, and disposal in large molecules, clusters, condensed phase, and biophysical systems. Electron Transfer: From Isolated Molecules to Biomolecules is the first book devoted to the exciting work being done in nonradiative electron transfer dynamics today. This two-part edited volume emphasizes the interdisciplinary nature of the field, bringing together the contributions of pioneers in chemistry, physics, and biology. Both theoretical and experimental topics are featured. The authors describe modern approaches to the exploration of different systems, including supersonic beam techniques, femtosecond laser spectroscopy, chemical syntheses, and methods in genetic and chemical engineering. They examine applications in such areas as supersonic jets, solvents, electrodes, semi- conductors, respiratory and enzymatic protein systems, photosynthesis, and more. They also relate electron transfer and radiationless transitions theory to pertinent physical phenomena, and provide a conceptual framework for the different processes. Complete with over two hundred illustrations, Part One reviews developments in the field since its inception fifty years ago, and discusses electron transfer phenomena in both isolated molecules and in clusters. It outlines the general theory, exploring areas of the control of kinetics, structure-function relationships, fluctuations, coherence, and coupling to solvents with complex spectral density in different types of electron transfer processes. Timely, comprehensive, and authoritative, Electron Transfer: From Isolated Molecules to Biomolecules is an essential resource for physical chemists, molecular physicists, and researchers working in nonradiative dynamics today.

Examining the role played by partial charge transfer in biology, this work offers a theroetical basis of the physics and chemistry of charge transfer complex formation, especially the function of excited states. It discusses drug interactions, highlighting interaction between different types of antibiotics and suggests ways for the synthesis of pharmaceutical products with reduced side effects.

Molecules in liquid and solid media are exposed to strong inter action forces from the surrounding medium. The formulation of a comprehensive theory of chemical processes in condensed media is consequently an elaborate task involving concepts from several areas of the natural sciences. Within the las~ two and a half decades very notable results towards the formulation of a 'unified' quantum mechanical theory of such processes have in fact been achieved, and by the variety of physical, chemical, and biological processes which can be suitably covered by this framework, the new theory represents an adequate alternative to the transition state theory. The present work has a two-fold purpose. Firstly, to provide a reasonably organized exposition of some basic aspects of these developments. This part emphasizes the fundamental similarities between chemical and other kinds of radiationless processes and includes the derivation of the most important rate expressions without resorting to involved mathematical techniques. The s- ond major purpose is to illustrate the 'unified' character of the rate theory by analysis of a considerable amount of expe- mental data from both 'conventional' kinetics and from such untraditional areas as low-temperature, strongly exothermic, and biological processes. Particular attention is here given to those systems for which a classical description is inadequate, and which provide a diagnostic distinction between several alternative theoretical approaches.

Various aspects of electron and proton transfer in chemistry and biology are described in this volume. The joint presentation was chosen for two reasons. Rapid electron and proton transfer govern cellular energetics in both the most primitive and higher organisms with photosynthetic and heterotrophic lifestyles. Further, biology has become the area where the various disciplines of science, which were previously diversified, are once again converging. The book begins with a survey of physicochemical principles of electron transfer in the gas and solid phase, with thermodynamic and photochemical driving force. Inner and outer sphere mechanisms and the coupling of electron transfer to nuclear rearrangements are reviewed. These principles are applied to construct artificial photosynthesis, leading to biological electron transfer involving proteins with transition metal and/or organic redox centres. The tuning of the free energy profile on the reaction trajectory through the protein by single amino acids or by the larger ensemble that determines the electrostatic properties of the reaction path is one major issue.Another one is the transformation of one-electron to paired-electron steps with protection against hazardous radical intermediates. The diversity of electron transport systems is represented in various chapters with emphasis on photosynthesis, respiration and nitrogenases. The book will be of interest to scientists in chemistry, physics and the life sciences.