New chemical synthetic methods for reacting phenols selectively with different molecules and with itself: use of electricity as a sustainable, economic and traceless reagent.
Inventing new green and inexpensive synthetic methods for relevant chemical compounds is one of the ways how organic chemist can contribute to the well-being of humans and Earth.  One of the most promising chemical method for this is synthetic organic electrochemistry. It can replace chemical reducing agents and oxidizers with sole cheap electrons or electron-holes and, at the same time, reduce both the amount of waste and the expense of chemical synthesis. Syntheses are easily controllable as they can be ‘switched-off’ and they are implementable on a large industrial scale with ease. Interestingly, organic electrosynthesis can be used to stabilize electrical grids as fluctuating electric currents are tolerated in certain reactions. 

The aim of this project is to develop new sustainable, selective and economic electro-organic synthetic methods for the functionalization of phenols. Particularly, we will concentrate on our efforts for finding new ways to form C-heteroatom bonds between phenols and different substrates. At first, we will study the conversion of phenols to diarylethers and dibenzofurans that are important building blocks and core structures of natural products and biologically active substances. Later, we will try to extend the reactivity for phenol-analogues as wll. On the next step, we will study the cross-coupling between phenols and benzoxazoles and its analogues. In this way, we also obtain important synthetic intermediates for organic chemistry in a sustainable and ecologic manner. The proposed action is divided in two research and three additional work packages. 

The project will be implemented at the Institute of Organic Chemistry of Johannes-Gutenberg-University in Mainz in the research group of Professor Siegfried Waldvogel. He has been one of the driving forces of electro-organic synthesis already for 18 years and made seminal contributions during that time. It is therefore the top laboratory worldwide for performing the proposed action.