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Primary amines are the most abundant of commercial building blocks, yet their synthetic utility has traditionally been dominated by reactions at nitrogen. In 2019, the pharmaceutical industry identified their direct C–H functionalisation as a “key unsolved problem for synthetic chemistry”. In 2020, our group delivered a catalytic solution to this longstanding challenge, combining visible-light photoredox and azidyl radical-mediated hydrogen atom transfer (HAT) catalysis to enable direct α-C–H functionalisation of unprotected primary amines. This breakthrough established a versatile platform for constructing challenging α-tertiary amines and saturated N-heterocycles, including spirocycles, directly from simple primary amines.
Continuous-flow chemistry is an integral part of our research, enabling precise control over reaction conditions, improved safety, and the efficient translation of new synthetic methods from laboratory discovery to preparative scale. We are particularly interested in combining flow technology with visible-light photocatalysis, where enhanced irradiation efficiency, heat transfer, and control over reaction times and temperatures offer significant advantages over conventional batch processing. Using specialised photochemical flow reactors, we develop scalable and robust synthetic methodologies for the preparation of valuable amines and nitrogen heterocycles, including transformations that benefit from cryogenic conditions or are challenging to achieve in batch.
Another major area of activity includes the development of fully-automated, stereocontrolled methods to access to libraries of enantiopure N-heterocycles for use in chemical biology and drug discovery.
Funding and support is gratefully acknowledged from:
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