My work on computing complex catalyzed organic transformations reveals that only a few subtle chemical factors, e.g. non-classical hydrogen bonding, (hyper)conjugation and steric effects, common across different catalyst manifolds are critical for catalysis and selectivity. Rational manipulation and exploitation of these factors has led to improved catalyst designs, which has...
Disposal of chlorinated hydrocarbons is a major environmental concern due to the lack of a satisfactory means of safe remediation at all contaminated locations. Current technologies rely primarily on incineration, a process that can lead to dangerous byproducts such as dioxin. If the chlorine substituent can be removed prior to...
Ambifunctional axially chiral 2,2',6,6'-tetrasubstituted biphenyls containing nucleophilic (or basic) functional groups juxtaposed with hydrogen-bond donors were synthesized and their properties studied. Applications for the prepared biaryls as potential organocatalysts for enantioselective carbon-carbon bond forming reactions were examined. Processes investigated included: aldol, Michael, nitroaldol (Henry), and Baylis-Hillman reactions.
The novel amidoamine...
Automation of computational chemistry, while only an engineering feat, has the potential to accelerating computational research be removing all by the science. The work in this thesis mainly discusses fundamental understanding of complex chemical systems. What is not obvious are the numerous tasks necessary for this fundamental understanding. Under the...