Department of Chemistry

Our research programme targets the activation of C-H bonds with low acidity (pKa > 35) that are present in readily available and frequently used substrates for organic reactions. In the long term, we believe that investigation into the oxidative addition of C-H bonds with various electronic and steric environments should greatly enhance the mechanistic understanding, and will ultimately allow the development of C-H activation processes for simple alkanes. The immediate interest is to develop asymmetric catalytic methods based on a novel C-H disconnection strategy that will provide advantageous alternatives to conventional transformations, which would lead to remarkable short-cuts for organic synthesis. We aim to address the following challenges in the area of catalytic C-H activation involving interdisciplinary approaches from organometallic, bioinorganic and synthetic chemistry:

• Design and characterisation of novel interactions to promote oxidative addition of C-H bonds to a metal centre with programmable site selectivity; Elaboration of R-M-H species generated in C-H activation to effect C-O bond, C-N bond and C-C bond forming reactions; Chiral recognition of sp³ C-H bonds that will lead to a new generation of asymmetric catalytic methods.
  

• Biomimetic reoxidation of the low valence metal species to close the catalytic cycle; Understanding oxygenation of C-H bonds catalysed by iron-containing enzymes and synthetic assemblies. Our primary objective is the establishment of a reliable chemical probe to reveal mechanistic details of how the iron oxo species react, and to enable the rational design of new ligands for iron containing system that parallels oxygenases.
  

Selected Publications

Stereoselective deoxygenation, Chem. Commun. 2002, 2860; Tetrahedron Lett. 2001, 42, 4219; J. Org. Chem. 1996, 61, 3234.

Mechanistic investigation into hydrogenation, Eur. J. Chem. 1999, 2237; Chem. Commun. 1998, 1935; Chem. Commun. 1998, 1103; J. Am. Chem. Soc. 1997, 119, 5257 (highlighted in Chemistry and Industry, 1998 and 1999, and included in Advanced Inorganic Chemistry, pp1232-1233 (Ed. Cotton, Wilkinson, Murillo, Bochmann, sixth edition).

Mechanistic investigation into Wacker oxidation, Chem. Commun. 2001, 1844.

Nanocatalysis, Org. Lett. 2003, 5, 4665; Chem. Commun. 2003, 678.

Regioselective allylic oxidation of C-H bonds, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2003, 125, 3232; Org. Lett. 2002, 4, 2727.