Physical organic chemistry – the study of the interplay between structure and reactivity in organic molecules – underpins organic chemistry, and we cannot imagine organic chemistry as a subject without knowledge of mechanism and reactivity. It is sometimes thought that the golden age of ‘physical organic chemistry’ was in the 20th century, when systematic information about mechanism first burst...

javad afsar was born in 1988 in hamedan, iran. he obtained his b.sc. (2011) and m.sc. in organic chemistry (2013) from bu-ali sina university, hamedan, iran. currently, he is working towards his ph.d. under the supervision of prof. mohammad ali zolfigol and prof. ardashir khazaei at the same university. his research involves design, synthesis and applications of new catalyst in organic synthesis.

Ionic liquid (IL) chemistry has evolved over the past century, such that these organic salts have impacted virtually every area of science and engineering. In the area of chemistry, initial applications of these salts were primarily the domain of chemists or chemical engineers who desired to manipulate the properties of IL solvents for a variety of applications including tuning various chemical...

To improve the teaching-learning process in the Medicinal Chemistry course, new strategies have been incorporated into practical classes of this fundamental discipline of the pharmaceutical curriculum. Many changes and improvements have been made in the area of medicinal chemistry so far, and students should be prepared for these new approaches with the use of technological resources in this fi...

Water has emerged as a versatile solvent for organic chemistry in recent years. Water as a solvent is not only inexpensive and environmentally benign, but also gives completely new reactivity. The types of organic reactions in water are broad including pericyclic reactions, reactions of carbanion equivalent, reactions of carbocation equivalent, reactions of radicals and carbenes, transition-met...

In the 1950’s Francis Crick formulated the “central dogma of molecular biology” in which information flows from DNA to RNA and finally to protein. Although certain exceptions to this model have emerged over the past 50 years, such as the discovery of RNA as the source of genetic information in certain viruses and the role of catalytic RNA in translation, this formulation has proved to be nearly...

This highlight discusses developments in transition metal-catalysed alkene and alkyne hydroacylation reactions over the past three years. The discussion summarizes the development of new catalyst systems for alkene and alkyne hydroacylation and applications to the synthesis of important ketone building blocks. The highlight captures transition metal-catalysed alkene and alkyne hydroacylation at...