Reading my newspaper on the way to work this morning, I was surprised to discover that Jonny Wilkinson – England rugby hero for those that don’t know – likes a bit of quantum physics. Apparently, he was always full of self-doubt until he discovered Schrödinger’s cat!
I subscribe to the theory that if you claim to fully understand quantum physics then you’ve missed the point, so quite what he means by this you’ll have to find out in his new book, but it set me to thinking: does anyone take solace in chemistry? Personally, I like a good total synthesis, but it’s more likely to make me wonder if I could ever have come up with that particularly clever rearrangement or new methodology, than to solve any thoughts of inadequacy.
Do you have a favourite piece of chemistry to think about when you need a bit of reassurance? How about some chemical reaction dynamics (Gav?), or perhaps you enjoy a good crystallography table (Neil?). We’d love to hear from you.
Steve
Stephen Davey (Associate Editor, Nature Chemistry)
It is intriguing to think about “impossible” reactions, i.e. the reaction that you would never expect to take place with that particular combination of reagents.
An old generation chemist told me that Heck reaction was considered as impossible. Some years ago nobody would believe that C-C bond could be made with releasing of HI in such simple manner. Now it is routine. The same has happed with many other transition-metal-catalyzed reactions. Several of them have appeared as “impossible” even in the eyes of experienced chemists.
When you open a recent issue of modern chemistry journal how many “impossible” reactions do you see? It is like you think that authors (and referees) are wrong and have assigned wrong structures, because the reaction is just impossible to go via that way?
Thinking about “impossible” reactions is an excellent reassurance (and the best proof that science is still alive, if any doubts ;-).