07367 IUPAC Gold Book - electron back-transfer 10.1351/goldbook.ET07367 ET07367 current 1 Thermal inversion of excited-state electron transfer restoring the donor and acceptor in their original oxidation state. In using this term one should also specify the resulting electronic state of the donor and acceptor. This term is preferred to back electron-transfer. It is recommended to use this term only for the process restoring the original electronic state of donor and acceptor. Should the forward electron transfer lead to charge separation, electron back-transfer will result in charge recombination. back electron-transfer https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/B00575 charge recombination https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/C00998 charge separation https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/C00999 electron transfer https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/E02011 electronic state https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/ET07026 excited-state https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/E02257 inversion https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/I03146 oxidation state https://goldbook.iupac.org//terms/view/O04365 PAC, 2007, 79, 293. 'Glossary of terms used in photochemistry, 3rd edition (IUPAC Recommendations 2006)' on page 329 (https://doi.org/10.1351/pac200779030293) https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/ET07367/html https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/ET07367/json https://goldbook.iupac.org/terms/view/ET07367/plain Citation: 'electron back-transfer' in IUPAC Compendium of Chemical Terminology, 5th ed. International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry; 2025. Online version 5.0.0, 2025. 10.1351/goldbook.ET07367 The IUPAC Gold Book is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike CC BY-SA 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) for individual terms. If you are interested in licensing the Gold Book for commercial use, please contact the IUPAC Executive Director at executivedirector@iupac.org . The International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) is continuously reviewing and, where needed, updating terms in the Compendium of Chemical Terminology (the IUPAC Gold Book). Users of these terms are encouraged to include the version of a term with its use and to check regularly for updates to term definitions that you are using. 2026-06-10T09:02:25+00:00