Min Shi and Yoshihisa Inoue
Aromatic phosphate, phosphonate, phosphinate and phosphine oxide have been used as effective sensitizers for the geometrical photoisomerization of (Z)-cyclooctene (1Z
) to its highly strained (E
)-isomer (1E
). Photosensitizations with phosphate and phosphonate gave moderate photostationary-state E/Z ratios of 0.14–0.17. A comparative study of the fluorescence quenching experiments and kinetic analysis of the product yield demonstrate that the photosensitized isomerization proceeds through a mixed mechanism that involves both singlet and triplet excited states. Triphenylphosphine oxide is not fluorescent and gave a low photostationary-state E/Z ratio of 0.05. Using (–)-menthyl or (–)-bornyl phosphate, phosphonate and phosphinate as chiral sensitizers, the enantiodifferentiating photoisomerization of 1Z was performed to afford optically active 1E in enantiomeric excesses ⩽5%.