Modifying Woodward-Hoffmann Stereoselectivity Under Vibrational Strong Coupling.

Vibrational strong coupling (VSC) has recently been shown to change the rate and chemoselectivity of ground-state chemical reactions via the formation of light-matter hybrid polaritonic states. However, the observation that vibrational-mode symmetry has a large influence on charge-transfer reactions under VSC suggests that symmetry considerations could be used to control other types of chemical selectivity through VSC. Here, we show that VSC influences the stereoselectivity of the thermal electrocyclic ring opening of a cyclobutene derivative, a reaction which follows the Woodward-Hoffmann rules.

Tilting a ground-state reactivity landscape by vibrational strong coupling.

Many chemical methods have been developed to favor a particular product in transformations of compounds that have two or more reactive sites. We explored a different approach to site selectivity using vibrational strong coupling (VSC) between a reactant and the vacuum field of a microfluidic optical cavity. Specifically, we studied the reactivity of a compound bearing two possible silyl bond cleavage sites-Si-C and Si-O, respectively-as a function of VSC of three distinct vibrational modes in the dark.

Metals promote sequences of the reverse Krebs cycle.

The reverse tricarboxylic acid (rTCA) cycle (also known as the reverse Krebs cycle) is a central anabolic biochemical pathway whose origins are proposed to trace back to geochemistry, long before the advent of enzymes, RNA or cells, and whose imprint remains intimately embedded in the structure of core metabolism. If it existed, a primordial version of the rTCA cycle would necessarily have been catalysed by naturally occurring minerals at the earliest stage of the transition from geochemistry to biochemistry. Here, we report non-enzymatic promotion of multiple reactions of the rTCA cycle in consecutive sequence, whereby 6 of its 11 reactions were promoted by Zn, Cr and Fe in an acidic aqueous solution.