Gregory C. Fu
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Gassman Lecture Series  


http://web.mit.edu/chemistry/fugroup/index.html

Greg Fu received his S.B. degree from MIT in 1985 where he worked in the laboratories of Prof. K. Barry Sharpless. He then pursued graduate work at Harvard under the guidance of Prof. David Evans. His research in the Evans lab focused on the scope and mechanism of the transition metal-catalyzed hydroboration reaction. Upon completion of his Ph. D. in 1991, he moved to Caltech where he working in the laboratories of Prof. Robert Grubbs as an NSF postdoctoral fellow. While there he was involved in demonstrating the synthetic utility of ring-closing olefin metathesis, particularly when applied to heterocycle formation. In 1993 he returned to MIT, joining the faculty in the department of chemistry. He has since risen through the ranks and is a professor of chemistry in that same department. Over the years he has received numerous awards and accolades. These include the Dreyfus New Faculty Award and Teacher-Scholar Award, Cottrell Scholar Award, Alfred P. Sloan Reearch Fellowship, Cope Scholar Award, and the ACS Corey Award. Past and current research in his laboratories has focused on developing planar chiral catalysts and ligands, exploring the synthesis and reactivity of boron heterocyces, and developing new palladium- and nickel-catalyzed coupling reactions that were not previously possible.

Asymmetric Catalysis with "Planar-Chiral Heterocycles": Nucleophilic Catalysis
November 12, 4:15 pm, 100 Smith

Due to the "handedness" of the molecules of life (peptides, DNA, RNA, carbohydrates, etc.), enantiomeric compounds often display quite different biological activity. The resulting need to efficiently generate compounds in enantiopure form (almost all of the Top 10 pharmaceutical drugs have chiral active ingredients) has led to burgeoning interest in asymmetric synthesis, and important progress has been achieved during the past few decades. Stereoselective reactions that are based on chiral catalysts, rather than on stoichiometric chiral reagents or on substrate-bound chiral auxiliaries, can be advantageous from the standpoints of efficiency and economy. Three of the most common approaches to accelerating a chemical reaction are to employ Brønsted-acid, Brønsted-base, or Lewis-acid catalysis. A less well-appreciated, but also common, mode of catalysis is nucleophilic (Lewis-base) catalysis. We have developed “planar-chiral” derivatives of 4 (dimethylamino)pyridine (DMAP), a widely
used nucleophilic catalyst, that are effective in a diverse array of reactions.
Announced Asymmetric Catalysis with "Planar-Chiral Heterocycles": Transition Metal-Catalyzed Reactions
November 13, 9:45 am, Smith 331
Palladium- and Nickel-Catalyzed Coupling Reactions
November 15, 9:45 am, Smith 331