Abstract

Most reactions set-up in the lab fail. This is one of the biggest challenges chemists face when designing new chemical transformations. This striking situation prompts two key questions: Why do reactions fail? Can failed reactions be used to trigger a paradigm-shift in reaction design? My group aims to tackle these questions by placing fundamental understanding at the center of process design. By capturing key intermediates and mapping elementary steps, we seek to uncover the underlying principles that dictate how reactions proceed—or why they do not. Rather than relying on mechanisms as post-hoc explanations, we use them as a priori tool for reaction design and discovery from the bottom-up. Our mechanism-driven philosophy not only enables the development of more efficient chemical processes but also fosters the discovery of unexpected new reaction modes, expanding the mechanistic landscape of modern synthetic chemistry.