Abstract
Axial ligands play a dominating role in determining the electronic structure and reactivity of iron porphyrin active sites and synthetic models. Several properties unique to the cysteine bound heme enzyme, cytochrome P450, is attributed to the "push effect" of the thiolate axial ligand. In this mini-review the ground state electronic structure of iron porphyrins with imidazole, phenolate and thiolate complexes, derived using a combination of spectroscopy and DFT calculations, are discussed. The differences in kinetics and selectivity of oxygen reduction reaction (ORR), catalyzed by these iron porphyrin complexes with different axial ligands, help elucidate the varying push effects of the different axial ligands on oxygen activation by ferrous porphyrin. The spectroscopic and kinetic data help to develop a quantitative understanding of the "push effect" and, in particular, the electrostatic and covalent contributions to it.