David B Obbard

Dehydration in Water. Solid-Supported Lipases as Green Catalysts for Esterification Catalytic esterification in water has been achieved with the aid of a commercially available polymer-supported lipase, Novozym-435. Remarkably, this well-known biocatalyst demonstrates significant activity towards esterification using just water as reaction medium. This methodology features representative esterifications of complex acids and alcohols, in the presence of unprotected amines.

Challenging cross couplings, in water, aided by in-situ iodination of (hetero)aromatic bromides Palladium-catalyzed reactions that involve functionalized substrates are oftentimes problematic. Those involving aryl or heteroaryl bromides that are either resistant to, or inefficient in such couplings present challenges that are difficult to overcome and may require development of an entirely new route, or worse, no opportunity to install the desired group using a standard coupling strategy.