H.Kim Lab

Most chemical reactions take several elementary steps to complete, and a reactive intermediates is high-energy, short-lived molecule that exists in one of the intermediate steps. Thus, in case of short-lived untamed molecules that immediately decompose or isomerize to different forms, the chemical transformation using them is generally hard to achieve. For example, rapid intramolecular reactions often foil attempts at selective bimolecular reactions. Typically, the reaction time in organic synthesis is minutes to hours, not less than a second, because chemical experiments is carried out by our slow hands. By the way, the controllability of short reaction time is one of the most unique & powerful advantages of flow chemistry. The reaction time in organic synthesis is typically defined as a time interval between the addition time of a reagent and that of a quencher. In flow chemistry, in the other hands, it is defined as a residence time between the reagent inlet and quencher inlet in reaction device. Thus, the reaction time can be easily adjusted to less than a second, by reducing the volume of device. In other words, reaction time can be translated to reaction space in flow chemistry. Even extremely short period of time which is unreachable to human being, can be handled by the precise control of reaction space (reaction hardware). Based on the unique feature of flow chemistry, we aim to develop various synthetic transformations involving short-lived untamed intermediates. We aim to achieve the synthesis of various natural products, bio-active molecules and functional material compounds, by performing continuous flow reactions in an integrated reaction system. Heteroatoms bearing highly reactive leaving group are known to be unstable. For example, amines bearing a benzo