(Fig. 1). Our intention is rather to visualize current research
horizons and to stimulate further endeavors into this exciting
new branch of inorganic photochemistry and photocatalysis,
which started about a decade ago (3,8).
II. Inorganic Photochemistry Inspired by Nature
Studying the inorganic chemistry of life already has a long his-
tory ( 9 ). What we now call biological inorganic (bioinorganic and
bio-organometallic) chemistry (10,11) is a cross-disciplinary
research topic primarily concerned with the role of metals in
biology and life sciences. It turned out that approximately
one quarter of the known chemical elements has a crucial function
for living organisms and that metal ions are of fundamental impor-
tance for all biological systems. A large share of the structurally
characterized biological macromolecules contains inorganic
cofactors. For instance, the majority of all known enzymes are
metalloproteins with one or more transition metal ions such as
V, (Cr), Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, Cu, Zn, Mo, or W in their respective active
site. Coordination chemistry undoubtedly plays a critical part in
stabilizing protein structures ( 12 ). The various other functions of
metalloproteins in biological systems are illustrated in Table I.
LIGHT EXCITATION (UV/VIS/NIR)
BIOMIMETIC AND BIO-INSPIRED SYSTEMS
BIO
INORGANIC
PHOTOCHEMISTRY
INORGANIC CHEMISTRY
ORGANOMETALLICS
BIOCHEMISTRY
MICROBIOLOGY
ORGANIC COFACTORS PHYSIOLOGY
MEDICINAL
CHEMISTRY
SUPRAMOLECULAR
CHEMISTRY
hn
FIG. 1. Origins and impacts of bioinorganic photochemistry.
PHOTOSENSITIZATION AND PHOTOCATALYSIS 237