British Journal Publishes Inorganic Chemistry Research of NJIT Professor

The piece is available in the journal’s web edition.  Dalton Transactions is a publication of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

The illustration summarizes work initiated in Gorun's laboratory, supported by the US Army, to understand the architecture and reveal the reactivity of a class of molecules inspired by nature, but made more resistant by replacing weak C-H bonds by much stronger C-F bonds. This work illustrates the principle of bio-inspired chemistry, a term Gorun has coined.

In two back-to-back communications, the NJIT researchers and their collaborators uncover the way some of the new molecules twist and arrange themselves in crystals. Related, larger molecules generate, very efficiently, a highly-reactive species of oxygen, while resisting its attack, thus constituting a "Teflon-coated" industrial reactor as a single molecule.  The catalytic activity, incorporation of oxygen into an industrially relevant organic substrate, requires only light and air, a desirable feature for sustainable "green chemistry.”