Reviews in Computational Chemistry Volume 18

CHAPTER 4
New Developments in the Theoretical
Description of Charge-Transfer
Reactions in Condensed Phases
Dmitry V. Matyushov* and Gregory A. Voth y
* Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Arizona State
University, Tempe, Arizona 85287-1604, and y Department of
Chemistry and Henry Eyring Center for Theoretical Chemistry,
University of Utah, 315 South 1400 East, Salt Lake City,
Utah 84112
INTRODUCTION
Reviews in Computational Chemistry, Volume 18
Edited by Kenny B. Lipkowitz and Donald B. Boyd
Copyr ight © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, I nc.
ISBN: 0-471-21576-7
Nearly half a century of intense research in the field of electron transfer
(ET) reactions in condensed phases has produced remarkable progress in the
experimental and theoretical understanding of the key factors influencing the
kinetics and thermodynamics of these reactions. The field evolved in order to
describe many important processes in chemistry and is actively expanding into
biological and materials science applications. 1 Due to its significant experimental
background and relative simplicity of the reaction mechanism, the
problem of electron transitions in condensed solvents turned out to be a
benchmark for testing fundamental theoretical approaches to chemical activation.
A number of excellent reviews dealing with various aspects of the field
have been written. Two volumes of Advances in Chemical Physics (Vols.
106 and 107, 1999) covered much of the progress in the field achieved in
recent decades. Therefore, the aim of this chapter is not to replicate these
147