Iron-dependent enzymes and biomimetic iron complexes can catalyze the ring cleavage of very inert, aromatic compounds. The mechanisms of these transformations and the factors that lead either to extradiol cleavage or intradiol cleavage have not been fully understood. By using density functional theory we have elucidated the mechanism of the catalytic cycle for two biomimetic complexes, and explained the difference in the experimentally obtained products

The following organizations are thanked for financial support: the Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad (MINECO, projects CTQ2014-59212-P and CTQ2015-70851-ERC) and the DIUE of the Generalitat de Catalunya (project 2014SGR1202, and Xarxa de Referència en Química Teòrica i Computacional). Financial support was provided by MICINN and the FEDER fund (European Fund for Regional Development) under grant UNGI10-4E-801, and the Serbian Ministry of Education and Science (Grant No. 172035). This work was performed in them framework of COST Action CM1305 “Explicit Control Over Spin-states in Technology and Biochemistry (ECOSTBio)” (STSM reference: COST-STSM-CM1305-21136)