Ball-milling and pestle and mortar grinding have emerged as powerful methods for the development of environmentally benign chemical transformations. Recently, the use of these mechanochemical techniques in asymmetric organocatalysis has increased. This review highlights the progress in asymmetric organocatalytic reactions assisted by mechanochemical techniques.

We investigated the use of mechanical stress to bend carbon-carbon triple bonds. Formation of an isoquinoline after reaction with a benzyl azide trap points towards a nucleophilic addition mechanism, differentiating mechanochemical trans-bending of π bonds from the typical reactivity observed for cisoidal bending of triple bonds in strained cyclic alkynes.

Mechanochemistry provides an environmentally sustainable approach to prepare and process molecules materials offers a new research space full of opportunities. However, its industrial potential has not yet been realized. Herein, we discuss opportunities offered challenges laying ahead for the adoption mechanochemical manufacturing technologies into industry.

Kinesins are P-loop NTPases that can do mechanical work. Like small G-proteins, to which they are related, kinesins execute a program of active site conformational changes that cleaves the terminal phosphate from an NTP substrate. But unlike small G-proteins, kinesins can amplify and harness these conformational changes in order to exert force. In this short review I summarize current ideas abo...

Neat grinding and solvent-drop grinding methods are found to be effective screening tools for indicating the potential for crystalline salt formation involving a given acid-base pair, as demonstrated with two model pharmaceuticals.

Current activity in, and future prospects for, the incorporation of mechanochemically active functional groups (‘‘mechanophores’’) into polymers is reviewed. This area of research is treated in the context of two categories. The first category is the development of new chemistry in the service of material science, through the design and synthesis of mechanophores to provide stress-sensing and/o...