Particle aggregation and film agglomeration have been among the main technical hurdles for solid-state thin film development and have been observed in many semiconductor and catalytic systems. In heterogeneous catalysis, particle aggregation leads to reduction of effective surface area and degradation of catalytic performance. On semiconductor surfaces, film agglomeration may give rise to elect...

The synthesis of inorganic-organic composites and mesoporous materials with structures and functions over different length scales has ramifications in diverse areas, such as large-molecule catalysis, biomolecule separations, miniaturization of electronic devices, chromatographic supports, the formation of semiconductor nanostructures, and the development of medical implants.1-8 The use of organ...

Various types of aldehydes undergo crossed-Aldol condensation with ketones in the presence of melamine trisulfonic acid (MTSA) under solvent-free conditions. The reported method is mild, efficient and has the advantages such as using heterogeneous catalysis, short reaction times, high yields of the products and the recyclability of the catalyst.

Regioselective difunctionalization of alkenes has attracted significant attention from synthetic chemists and has the advantage of introducing diverse functional groups into vicinal carbons of common alkene moieties in a single operation. Herein, we report an unprecedented intermolecular atom transfer thiosulfonylation reaction of alkenes by combining gold catalysis and visible-light photoredox...

This introductory contribution to the special issue of Catalysis Today is dedicated to selected contributions presented at the Carbocat-IV (Carbon for Catalysis) Symposium held in Dalian (China) on November 7-10 (2010). The introduction first shortly overviews the main reasons for the interest on carbon materials for catalysis and the elements of novelty discussed on the contributions of this i...

The chemo- and regioselectivity and functional group compatibility in gold and palladium cooperatively catalyzed cross-coupling reactions were determined in the synthesis of lactones; the selectivity in the gold and palladium dual-metal catalysis system was distinct from that available for the same class of substrates in systems with only gold catalysis or only palladium catalysis rather than d...

Synergistic catalysis is a synthetic strategy wherein both the nucleophile and the electrophile are simultaneously activated by two separate and distinct catalysts to afford a single chemical transformation. This powerful catalysis strategy leads to several benefits, specifically synergistic catalysis can (i) introduce new, previously unattainable chemical transformations, (ii) improve the effi...

Over the past 40 years, transition metal catalysis has enabled bond formation between aryl and olefinic (sp(2)) carbons in a selective and predictable manner with high functional group tolerance. Couplings involving alkyl (sp(3)) carbons have proven more challenging. Here, we demonstrate that the synergistic combination of photoredox catalysis and nickel catalysis provides an alternative cross-...

Catalysis gets all tied up in knots Over the past decade, chemists have used metal ion templating to prepare a wide variety of knotted molecular strands. Marcos et al. now show that one such pentafoil knot can be applied to catalysis. When held taut by zinc ions, the knot can capture a chloride or bromide ion from a halocarbon, thereby unleashing the reactivity of the residual cation for applic...

The proposal that enzymatic catalysis is due to conformational fluctuations has been previously promoted by means of indirect considerations. However, recent works have focused on cases where the relevant motions have components toward distinct conformational regions, whose population could be manipulated by mutations. In particular, a recent work has claimed to provide direct experimental evid...