Prof. Shauna Paradine
Title: Catalytic strategies for the selective construction of sp3-rich organic scaffolds
Bio:
A native of rural southwest Michigan, Shauna obtained her B.A. in chemistry from Albion College. While there, she worked with Prof. Andrew N. French on the development of chiral hypervalent iodine catalysts for enantioselective α-oxytosylation and on the synthesis of dibenziodonium salts. She pursued her PhD studies in the group of Prof. M. Christina White at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Her Ph.D. research focused on pioneering the development of site- and chemoselective iron- and manganese-catalyzed C(sp3)–H amination reactions. Shauna’s passion for catalysis next led her to Prof. Eric N. Jacobsen’s lab at Harvard University, where she was an NIH Postdoctoral Fellow. Her research there entailed the use of co-catalysis with chiral dual hydrogen bond donors for the development of efficient chemo- and enantioselective multicomponent reactions. She began her independent career in July 2018 at the University of Rochester, where her research group uses transition metal catalysis to pursue novel strategies to form C–C bonds selectively, with the goal of enabling the efficient construction of topologically complex, sp3-rich organic scaffolds. In her independent career, she has received the Thieme Chemistry Journal Award, NSF CAREER Award, the NIH R35 MIRA, and Eli Lilly Grantee Award.
Abstract:
The topological complexity of sp3-rich scaffolds imparts specific beneficial properties into organic small molecules and enables refined tuning of a molecule’s properties. However, this complexity amplifies both reactivity and selectivity challenges, making the development of versatile methods to construct and diversify these structures difficult. By combining fundamental advances in transition metal catalysis with organic synthesis, we aim to discover new reactions to solve unmet challenges in the construction of functional sp3-rich organic scaffolds. In one area, we have found that identifying “unconventional” ligand platforms for palladium catalysis leads to new reactivity and selectivity in olefin heteroannulation reactions. In another area, we have found that copper complexes can promote a range of oxidative radical addition reactions.
Keywords: Organic synthesis, transition metal catalysis, synthetic method development
Hosts: Women in Chemistry and Queer in Chem