Olaf Wiest and Paul Helquist University of Notre Dame
This project will support research visits of 16 and 10 weeks, respectively, of three graduate and two undergraduate students from the University of Notre Dame to perform research in four of Germany's leading research groups at the University of Heidelberg in the area of catalysis. Catalysis represents the most important general technology in industrial chemistry. More than 80 percent of all chemical products, from pharmaceuticals to high-performance materials, result from use of catalysts at least once during their synthesis. Thus, the development of new and improved catalysts is a central topic in chemistry with huge environmental and economic benefits. Given Heidelberg's prominence in the field of catalysis (as evidenced by the work of several of the 18 winners of the Chemistry Nobel Prize affiliated with the University of Heidelberg) and the structured, long-term character of the proposed program, the students will not only gain the skills and experience but also have networking opportunities to thrive in today's international, interconnected world of science and business.
The research is divided into four broad areas covering a range of modern topics in catalysis that are common areas of strength researchers at the Universities of Notre Dame and Heidelberg: (i) Ligands, methodology and mechanisms in gold catalysis (Hashmi), (ii) chiral catalysts with polydentate stereodirecting ligands (Gade), (iii) Oxidation catalysis with high-valent transition metal complexes (Comba) and (iv) Single-Molecule Catalysis (Herten). The individual projects cover organic, metalorganic and physical chemistry aspects of catalysis are designed to interface the research interests of faculty members at the two participating universities. They incorporate a large number of new concepts such as a) new privileged ligand scaffolds that allow the precise positioning of directing groups, e.g. for nitrogen transfer reactions, b) new types of gold-catalyzed reactions such as photoredox catalysis without a secondary metal, c) novel ligands for the stabilization of biomimetic high-valent metals in catalysis and (d) the study of elementary reaction steps of important catalytic reactions such as metathesis or epoxidation reactions at the single molecule level. Their unifying principle is a rigorous structure- and mechanism-based approach whereby a range of advanced experimental and computational tools are used to generate a hypothesis, which is then tested experimentally in an iterative and accelerated fashion.
