New catalytic modes for carbon-carbon bond forming reactions

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Chemistry is a dynamic subject that is at the centre of many different scientific advances. Organic chemistry is concerned with the reactivity of carbon in all its different forms and can be viewed as the chemistry taking place within living things. Chemists are constantly looking for new ways of designing and building molecules (synthetic chemistry is essentially molecular architecture) and this proposal describes a short and powerful new way of making valuable molecules using a new catalytic system that works, uniquely, in combination with an unusual solvent. The molecules at the heart of the proposal are cyclic four-membered carbon containing compounds which are rare in organic chemistry and are underdeveloped and underexplored. We will bring together the different disciplines of organic chemistry, electrochemistry and computational chemistry to develop this area and to provide new applications, insight and synergies.The novel chemistry proposed here will provide a new, efficient and powerful way of making cyclic compounds using catalysis to control all aspects of the structures of the products formed: this will be of great benefit to both academia and industry who will be able to make interesting molecules (some that were otherwise inaccessible) in new ways. Given all of the above, it is imperative that we have novel, efficient and powerful methods for making new compounds so that we can study and use them. In addition, the development and application of new catalytic systems and solvent combinations is also important because catalysis makes chemical reactions run faster, and become cleaner with less waste: this is clearly a good thing for industry and also for the environment. The real advantage of this proposal is the combination of three different disciplines to study and understand a worthwhile chemical problem.