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Organic chemistry

Radical catalysis

Nature volume 447, pages 152–153 (2007)Cite this article

The domination of metals in catalysis is under threat as organic catalysts gain ground. The latest example may expand chemical reactivity beyond the achievements of traditional metal complexes.

Chemists are currently excited about a different take on organic synthesis, in which purely organic molecules are used as catalysts, rather than metals or enzymes. This previously neglected strategy holds great promise in areas such as drug discovery and materials science, and has already been used in several valuable reactions. But so far, these processes have involved only charged intermediates. Reporting in Science, MacMillan and colleagues1 now describe a general strategy for organocatalysis using radical intermediates — molecules that contain reactive single electrons. The principle behind this could lead to a new family of useful reactions.

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Figure 1: A radical mode of organocatalysis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Santanu Mukherjee and Benjamin List are at the Max-Planck-Institut für Kohlenforschung, D-45470 Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany. list@mpi-muelheim.mpg.de,

    Santanu Mukherjee & Benjamin List

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  1. Santanu Mukherjee
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  2. Benjamin List
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Mukherjee, S., List, B. Radical catalysis. Nature 447, 152–153 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/447152a

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