Exploration of New Chemical Reactivities for Synthetic Efficiency

The efficient making of new molecules is central to any new product in the pharmaceutical, materials science, microelectronics, and biotech industries.  Exploration of new chemical reactivities towards a sustainable future has been a long-term objective of our laboratory.  We have explored various unconventional chemical reactivities that can potentially simplify synthesis, decrease overall waste and maximize resource utilization. We planned our research in three progressive stages: (1) developing Grignard-type reactions in aqueous media to simplify protection-deprotections; (2) developing nucleophilic addition reactions by using C-H bonds as surrogates for organometallic reagents, to simplify halogenation-dehalogenation and avoid the utilization of a stoichiometric amount of metal for such reactions (possible in water); and (3) developing direct C-H and C-H coupling to explore the possibility of chemical transformations beyond functionalization and defunctionalization in syntheses. Within the last decade, we have studied the development of various unconventional methodologies directed at increasing efficiency for multi-step chemical synthesis.  Many of these new reactions can also be used to functionalize biomass directly.

Link to speakers web page: http://cjli.mcgill.ca/