Light mediated rearrangement of natural products

Yoshito Kishi and co-workers have published in JACS on the photochemistry of mycolactone A and B.

JACS paper

Similarly Hong-Xiang Lou and co-workers at Shandong University have published in JACS on the light induced interconversion of pallambins.

OL paper

Ullman with light

I guess Greg Fu made a statement at Caltech with his Science paper in collaboration with the Jonas Peters group. This Science paper discloses an Ullman reaction (copper mediated aryl iodide and amine coupling) in the presence of light.

 

Science paper

Acutimine approach

Sarah Reisman and colleague have reported in Organic Letters on their elegant approach to acutimine via a [2+2] cycloaddition – however, their retro-aldol reaction to open the cyclobutane ring failed.

OL paper

Ring size matters

Petr Klan (Masaryk University) and Richard Givens (University of Kansas) have reported in JOC on a study of the photo-Favorskii rearrangement.

JOC paper

Eliptifoline and ponapensin syntheses

John Porco and co-workers have reported in JACS on the synthesis of eliptifoline and ponapensin.

JACS paper

Chromium cascade

Nobuhara Iwasawa and co-workers at Tokyo Institute of Technology have reported in ACIE on a chromium catalyzed cascade.

ACIE paper

[2+2+2] for endoperoxides

Tehshik Yoon and co-workers at the University of Wisconsin have reported in Organic Letters on a [2+2+2] cyclization approach to form endoperoxides using oxygen (ie:  O2).

OL paper

Thiophene and alkene

Takeshi Ohkuma and co-workers at Hokkaido University have reported in Organic Letters on a light mediated intramolecular cyclization of a thiophene and an alkene.

OL paper

Frondosin via Paterno Buchi

Jonathan George and co-workers at the University of Adelaide have reported in Organic Letters on a Paterno Buchi reaction approach to access the 5 membered ring of frondosin.

OL paper

Photoredox catalysis

Yoshiaki Nishibayashi and co-workers at the University of Tokyo have reported in JACS on the use of an iridium photocatalyst to form alpha-aminoalkyl radicals.

What is photoredox catalysis anyway?  I have always been turned away from this kind of reaction because it always looked like people lit up a light bulb right next to their reactions to run these reactions, but I guess more and more people are starting to develop it.  People use a catalyst with a special ligand that allows it to undergo a metal to ligand charge transfer in the presence of low energy visible light.  The excited catalyst accepts an electron from a donor source (such as Hunig’s base).  This may be the reaction of 2012.

JACS paper