Anisotropic Iron Motion in Nitrosyl Iron Porphyrinates:Natural and Synthetic Hemes

The vibrational spectra of two five-coordinate nitrosyl iron porphyrinates, [Fe(OEP)(NO)] (OEP = dianion of 2,3,7,8,12,13,17,18-octaethylporphyrin) and [Fe(DPIX)(NO)] (DPIX = deuteroporphyrin IX), have been studied by oriented single-crystal nuclear resonance vibrational spectroscopy. Single crystals (both are in the triclinic crystal system) were oriented to give vibrational spectra perpendicular to the porphyrin plane. Additionally, two orthogonal in-plane measurements that were also either perpendicular or parallel to the projection of the FeNO plane onto the porphyrin plane yield the complete set of vibrations with iron motion. In addition to cleanly enabling the assignment of the FeNO bending and stretching modes, the measurements reveal that the two in-plane spectra from the parallel and perpendicular in-plane directions for both compounds have substantial differences. The assignment of these in-plane vibrations were aided by density functional theory predictions. The differences in the two in-plane...