Patrick Walsh
University of Pennsylvania, PA·Chemistry
Many medicines and crop chemicals contain sulfur bonded to carbon. Making these carbon–sulfur bonds cleanly, and with the right three-dimensional shape, is a key challenge in chemistry.
- Fields
Chemistry
- Topics
organic synthesis
organic chemistry
catalysis
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Aug 2029
What they work on
- Develop enantioselective nickel-catalyzed cross-electrophile coupling, which joins sulfur electrophiles with aryl or alkyl halides, to make diaryl and alkyl aryl sulfoxides enriched in one mirror-image form.
- Apply cross-electrophile coupling to azasulfur compounds, molecules with nitrogen bonded to sulfur, to make new sulfur-based building blocks.
- Investigate how nickel-catalyzed carbon–sulfur bond-forming reactions work, including the role of radical intermediates, through mechanistic studies.
- Optimize reaction yields and selectivities using high-throughput experimentation (24 or 96 reactions at once) and machine learning models of complex solvent mixtures.
More about the research
Sulfoxides are sulfur compounds that are important building blocks in synthesis and drug design. Many molecules come in two mirror-image forms, and a sulfoxide enriched in one form (enantioenriched) can behave very differently in the body from its mirror image. This project seeks sustainable ways to build such molecules using nickel, an earth-abundant metal, as the catalyst instead of rare precious metals.
Why it matters
Sustainable nickel-catalyzed routes to single mirror-image sulfur compounds could make it easier and greener to produce pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals and fine chemicals. The products are often biologically active themselves and can serve as building blocks for more elaborate molecules, which could help medicinal chemists and chemical manufacturers.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Gregory Fu
California Institute of Technology, CA·Chemistry
Develop nickel- and copper-catalyzed substitution reactions that couple families of alkyl electrophiles and nucleophiles not previously shown to react together, including highly hindered substrates.
Sarah Reisman
California Institute of Technology, CA·Chemistry
Develop a photoredox-catalyzed radical-polar crossover annulation (RPCA), a light-driven ring-forming reaction, to build the bridged bicyclo[3.2.1]octane core of the polyketide natural product enterocin.
Mark Biscoe
CUNY City College, NY·Chemistry
Develop palladium- and copper-catalyzed cross-coupling reactions that transfer handedness from enantioenriched secondary alkylboron reagents to new carbon centers with predictable retention or inversion.
The school
University of Pennsylvania: 90 labs on PI Pages, $2.2B a year on research, 750 research doctorates a year.
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