Emerging trends in the optimization of organic synthesis through high-throughput tools and machine learning

• Pablo Quijano Velasco,
• Kedar Hippalgaonkar and
• Balamurugan Ramalingam

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2025, 21, 10–38, doi:10.3762/bjoc.21.3

• supplied a flowing stream of 12 selectable solvents, an autosampler that injected microliter amounts of preselected reaction mixtures, and an LC–MS device for product characterization. Approximately 5,760 reactions were screened across a selection of 11 ligands, seven bases, and four solvents, along with

Chemical glycobiology

• Elisa Fadda,
• Rachel Hevey,
• Benjamin Schumann and
• Ulrika Westerlind

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2025, 21, 8–9, doi:10.3762/bjoc.21.2

• . [12] in the context of photoswitchable ligands to the lectin LecA. Staying in the theme of lectin characterization, Lundstrøm et al. study the glycan binding profile of CMA1 originating from melon [13]. A time that sees great opportunities in computational biology also breeds innovative applications

Reactivity of hypervalent iodine(III) reagents bearing a benzylamine with sulfenate salts

• Beatriz Dedeiras,
• Catarina S. Caldeira,
• José C. Cunha,
• Clara S. B. Gomes and
• M. Manuel B. Marques

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3281–3289, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.272

• ]; (ii) the incorporation of the iodine atom in the 5-membered heterocycle [10]; and (iii) the trans effect, due to the interaction of the hypervalent bonds established by the axial ligands, where iodine orbitals are shared with both heteroatoms [11]. As a result, benziodoxol(on)es have found application

Intramolecular C–H arylation of pyridine derivatives with a palladium catalyst for the synthesis of multiply fused heteroaromatic compounds

• Yuki Nakanishi,
• Shoichi Sugita,
• Kentaro Okano and
• Atsunori Mori

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3256–3262, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.269

• . The addition of ligand improved the yield of 2a as shown in Table 1, entries 7–10. Among several ligands, including Buchwald-type phosphines L1–L4 [33] examined, it was found that the use CyJohnPhos (L3) afforded the cyclized product in 90% yield and the reaction with PPh3 (L4) as a ligand was also

Multicomponent reactions driving the discovery and optimization of agents targeting central nervous system pathologies

• Lucía Campos-Prieto,
• Aitor García-Rey,
• Eddy Sotelo and
• Ana Mallo-Abreu

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3151–3173, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.261

• contributed to the development of promising ligands in recent years. Rather than providing an exhaustive overview, this review aims to highlight key studies that address major CNS pathologies, relevant drug targets, and various MCR approaches. We have carefully selected representative articles and apologize

• , traumatic brain injuries, and brain tumors. Finally, in elderhood, seizures are often linked to primary craniocephalic trauma, brain tumors, and neurodegenerative disorders [23]. This review centers on five neurological disorders where ligands obtained using multicomponent reactions (MCRs) have been

• representative articles and extend our apologies to authors whose important works may not be included. By focusing on these studies, we aim to present a clear and concise view of current research directions and significant advancements in the field. Review Ligands targeting CNS diseases obtained from MCR

Advances in the use of metal-free tetrapyrrolic macrocycles as catalysts

• Mandeep K. Chahal

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3085–3112, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.257

• metal-free porphyrins. 1.1 Calix[4]pyrrole macrocycles as organocatalysts Calix[4]pyrroles act as versatile ligands in supramolecular chemistry and have been widely studied as binding hosts for various guests such as anions, ion pairs, or neutral compounds [4][30][31], ligands for p-block elements, as

• well as transition and rare-earth metals [32][33]. There are many comprehensive reviews covering these two areas along with the connection of these ligands to supramolecular and medicinal chemistry [34][35][36]. In addition, calix[4]pyrroles, due to the presence of four accessible inner NHs and well

• activity in electrocatalytic HER [123]. Although free base corrole ligands demonstrated activity in HER, they were unstable in trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a common proton source, leading to rapid degradation during catalysis. Subsequently, the same group introduced metal-free xanthene-bridged biscorroles

Chemical structure metagenomics of microbial natural products: surveying nonribosomal peptides and beyond

• Thomas Ma and
• John Chu

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3050–3060, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.253

• , they serve as ligands for chelating iron in siderophores. Because ferric cations (Fe3+) mostly exist as insoluble solids in the Earth crust, most microorganisms produce and secrete siderophores to scavenge this scarce resource from their surroundings [67]. Whereas siderophores do not always contain

Tailored charge-neutral self-assembled L₂Zn₂ container for taming oxalate

• David Ocklenburg and
• David Van Craen

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 3007–3015, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.250

• coordinating or which can act as good chelating ligands [65]. The latter holds true for oxalate as shortest dicarboxylate anion which likely forms complexes with all sorts of metals [66][67]. In fact, oxalate’s ideal ligand character is one reason for the aforementioned diseases and this property poses a fatal

• hazard for metallocages and metallocontainers. The dianion is capable of competing with the ligands used for self-assembled metal-based receptors instead of being bound inside the host structure as intended. Oxalate can strip off metal centers from the designed receptor causing a full or partial

Advances in radical peroxidation with hydroperoxides

• Oleg V. Bityukov,
• Pavel Yu. Serdyuchenko,
• Andrey S. Kirillov,
• Gennady I. Nikishin,
• Vera A. Vil’ and
• Alexander O. Terent’ev

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2959–3006, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.249

Recent advances in transition-metal-free arylation reactions involving hypervalent iodine salts

• Ritu Mamgain,
• Kokila Sakthivel and
• Fateh V. Singh

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2891–2920, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.243

• significant as it circumvents the use of costly and hazardous metals and ligands which are commercially not available. In order to obtain a variety of synthetically desirable tetrasubstituted α-aryl-α-fluoroacetoacetamides 7, Zaheer et al. disclosed a straightforward, metal-free technique for the α-arylation

N-Glycosides of indigo, indirubin, and isoindigo: blue, red, and yellow sugars and their cancerostatic activity

• Peter Langer

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2840–2869, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.240

• antitumor effects were related to the inhibition of the survival pathway of c-Jun and JNK2 (Jun N-terminal kinase). In an additional study, it was shown that treatment with derivative E-β-46b results in an increase of melanoma cell sensitivity for death ligands and allows to overcome resistance against

Synthesis and antimycotic activity of new derivatives of imidazo[1,2-a]pyrimidines

• Dmitriy Yu. Vandyshev,
• Daria A. Mangusheva,
• Khidmet S. Shikhaliev,
• Kirill A. Scherbakov,
• Oleg N. Burov,
• Alexander D. Zagrebaev,
• Tatiana N. Khmelevskaya,
• Alexey S. Trenin and
• Fedor I. Zubkov

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2806–2817, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.236

• fingerprints (IFP) between the docking ligands and the protein shows that, similar to the reference ligand voriconazole, the compounds interact with the protein through hydrophobic interactions with hydrophobic residues of the protein and the formation of coordination bonds with the haem iron (Table 3). At the

• pocket formed by residues Y122, L508, F504 and I373. The superposition of the selected and docked ligands reveals that compounds 4a–e are arranged in an identical manner, whereas the position of compound 5e, particularly tetrahydroimidazo[1,2-a]pyrimidine, is significantly disparate (Figure 5B

C–C Coupling in sterically demanding porphyrin environments

• Liam Cribbin,
• Brendan Twamley,
• Nicolae Buga,
• John E. O’ Brien,
• Raphael Bühler,
• Roland A. Fischer and
• Mathias O. Senge

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2784–2798, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.234

• compared to the 85 °C used in the synthesis of the para-equivalent 26 gave no conversion and was accompanied by the formation of palladium black [49]. No reactivity was observed by either TLC or mass spectrometry when switching back to Pd2(dba)3 with three different ligands SPhos, XantPhos, and Rac-Binap

• observed with the β-ethyl CH3 resonances splitting into two separate chemical environments; however, the identity of the product synthesized was not fully characterized. In future, if reactivity for OET-o-BrPPs were to be further explored a larger library of ligands whether biphenyl-based or other could be

Copper-catalyzed yne-allylic substitutions: concept and recent developments

• Shuang Yang and
• Xinqiang Fang

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2739–2775, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.232

• stereocenter of the product is controlled by the catalyst. A single crystal of Cu(I) was investigated by X-ray and proved to be the dicopper complex, while the Cu(II) catalyst was revealed as mononuclear copper coordinated with two ligands. Further kinetic isotope experiments and nonlinear relationship studies

• showed that the reaction exhibits a negative nonlinear effect, while the kinetic experiments indicate that a mono-copper catalyst might be involved in the rate-limiting step. They speculated that the observed nonlinear effect might arise from the existence of both the inactive homo-dimer of ligands and

Synthesis of benzo[f]quinazoline-1,3(2H,4H)-diones

• Ruben Manuel Figueira de Abreu,
• Peter Ehlers and
• Peter Langer

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2708–2719, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.228

• -Flight (TOF) LC–MS. The solvent, toluene, was purchased as dry solvent and applied without further purification. Other reagents, catalysts, ligands, acids, and bases were used as purchased from commercial suppliers. Column chromatography was performed on Merck Silica gel 60 (particle size 63–200 μm

Synthesis of fluoroalkenes and fluoroenynes via cross-coupling reactions using novel multihalogenated vinyl ethers

• Yukiko Karuo,
• Keita Hirata,
• Atsushi Tarui,
• Kazuyuki Sato,
• Kentaro Kawai and
• Masaaki Omote

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2691–2703, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.226

• previous study by Thorand [44], we performed the reaction between fluorine-containing vinyl ether 1a and 1.05 equiv of trimethylsilylacetylene (5a) to afford the corresponding enyne 3a in 55% yield (Table 2, entry 1). Cross-coupling utilizing a palladium(II) catalysts containing phosphine ligands produced

Deciphering the mechanism of γ-cyclodextrin’s hydrophobic cavity hydration: an integrated experimental and theoretical study

• Stiliyana Pereva,
• Stefan Dobrev,
• Tsveta Sarafska,
• Valya Nikolova,
• Silvia Angelova,
• Tony Spassov and
• Todor Dudev

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2635–2643, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.221

• placement/locality of these water molecules in α-, β-, and γ-CDs is a matter of continuing debate. The water ligands could be coordinated inside the cavity or around either rim. Note that CDs retain some water molecules (numbers and position depending on the nature of the guest molecule) after the inclusion

Transition-metal-free synthesis of arylboronates via thermal generation of aryl radicals from triarylbismuthines in air

• Yuki Yamamoto,
• Yuki Konakazawa,
• Kohsuke Fujiwara and
• Akiya Ogawa

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2577–2584, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.216

• with halogen or triflate groups. Recently, transition-metal-catalyzed direct borylation of arenes via C–H bond activation has been reported, although the design of the substrate and ligands is somewhat complicated [16][17][18][19][20][21][22]. Since the complete removal of catalyst-derived metal

A review of recent advances in electrochemical and photoelectrochemical late-stage functionalization classified by anodic oxidation, cathodic reduction, and paired electrolysis

• Nian Li,
• Ruzal Sitdikov,
• Ajit Prabhakar Kale,
• Joost Steverlynck,
• Bo Li and
• Magnus Rueping

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2500–2566, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.214

HFIP as a versatile solvent in resorcin[n]arene synthesis

• Hormoz Khosravi,
• Valeria Stevens and
• Raúl Hernández Sánchez

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2469–2475, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.211

• tetracarboxylic acid head group and short-to-long aliphatic tails from ethyl to n-undecyl may find applications in the development of novel materials, e.g., as ligands in nanoparticle synthesis. We were surprised to find out that 2-iodoresorcinol did not produce the desired resorcin[n]arene. Repeated experiments

Hypervalent iodine-mediated cyclization of bishomoallylamides to prolinols

• Smaher E. Butt,
• Konrad Kepski,
• Jean-Marc Sotiropoulos and
• Wesley J. Moran

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2455–2460, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.209

• an associative pathway where one of the TFA ligands dissociates from 8 upon approaching the substrate and forms the intermediate 9. The calculated ΔG‡ value is quite high here, which could explain the low yield obtained after 16 hours. However, for the cyclization of N-allylbenzamide (1a), we found

Efficient one-step synthesis of diarylacetic acids by electrochemical direct carboxylation of diarylmethanol compounds in DMSO

• Hisanori Senboku and
• Mizuki Hayama

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2392–2400, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.203

• a carboxy group using carbon dioxide as carboxy source is generally difficult under neutral and mild conditions without the use of metal catalysts and/or ligands. This protocol represents a novel method for synthesizing diarylacetic acids 2 from the corresponding alcohols 1 in one step by using an

Synthesis, electrochemical properties, and antioxidant activity of sterically hindered catechols with 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,2,4-triazole, thiazole or pyridine fragments

• Daria A. Burmistrova,
• Andrey Galustyan,
• Nadezhda P. Pomortseva,
• Kristina D. Pashaeva,
• Maxim V. Arsenyev,
• Oleg P. Demidov,
• Mikhail A. Kiskin,
• Andrey I. Poddel’sky,
• Nadezhda T. Berberova and
• Ivan V. Smolyaninov

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2378–2391, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.202

• derivatives are used as ligands in the synthesis of metal complexes (Ni(II), Pd(II), Pt(II), Cu(I), Ag(I) etc.) exhibiting antibacterial and antitumor activity [34]. In most cases, polyfunctional catechol thioethers were obtained by Michael reaction via the interaction of o-, p-benzoquinone and the

Catalysing (organo-)catalysis: Trends in the application of machine learning to enantioselective organocatalysis

• Stefan P. Schmid,
• Leon Schlosser,
• Frank Glorius and
• Kjell Jorner

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2280–2304, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.196

• and type II’ β-hairpin. Even though the latter was consistently lower in ground state energy (up to 6 kcal/mol for some catalysts), predictive models for enantioselectivity were found for both catalyst conformers in separate MLR models. For organophosphorous ligands of transition metal complexes, the

• minimum buried volume in a conformer ensemble was identified to determine the ligation state towards a metal centre as either mono- or bis-ligated and thus providing a threshold for catalytically active ligands [87]. All of these examples demonstrate that not only the type of descriptor is important, but

Factors influencing the performance of organocatalysts immobilised on solid supports: A review

• Zsuzsanna Fehér,
• Dóra Richter,
• Gyula Dargó and
• József Kupai

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2024, 20, 2129–2142, doi:10.3762/bjoc.20.183

• modifications play a more important role. MOFs are a type of porous crystalline polymers where organic ligands are coordinated to metal clusters [80][81][82][83][84][85][86][87][88][89][90]. The framework can be post-synthetically modified by functional organic sites, often specifically chiral functionalities

• , giving easily recyclable asymmetric catalysts. The asymmetric sites can be different types, commonly they are binaphthyl-, biphenyl- [91][92][93] and proline-based [94][95]. COFs are a type of crystalline porous material, consisting of covalently linked organic ligands [96][97]. Since the framework only

• has organic building blocks, both condensation [98] and post-synthetic modification [99] methods can be used to immobilise organocatalysts. Asymmetric organocatalysis is commonly achieved by pyrrolidone ligands, with great results in a variety of reactions, such as Michael [100] and aldol [101