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Synthesis at the molecular frontier

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Driven by remarkable advances in the understanding of structure and reaction mechanisms, organic synthesis will be increasingly directed to producing bioinspired and newly designed molecules.

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Figure 1: Structural and functional inspirations from natural products.

I. SPENCE/VISUALS UNLIMITED/GETTY IMAGES; K. LEE

Figure 2: The development of new reactions for step-economical total synthesis.
Figure 3: The use of cascade reactions to rapidly generate complexity and value.
Figure 4: Developing ideal syntheses.
Figure 5: Function-oriented synthesis as applied to bryostatin.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Paul A. Wender is in the Chemistry Department and, the Department of Chemical and Systems Biology, by courtesy, Stanford University, 333 Campus Drive, Stanford, California 94305-5080, USA. wenderp@stanford.edu,

    Paul A. Wender

  2. Benjamin L. Miller is in the School of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Rochester, 601 Elmwood Avenue, Box 697, Rochester, New York 14642, USA. Benjamin_miller@urmc.rochester.edu,

    Benjamin L. Miller

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  1. Paul A. Wender
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Wender, P., Miller, B. Synthesis at the molecular frontier. Nature 460, 197–201 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/460197a

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