Chemical Communications Blog

The international speakers assembled early on Thursday morning to make the final journey to Nankai University, Tianjin. After a flight and a two hour journey on the ChemComm minibus, we arrived at our hotel directly opposite the entrance gates to Nankai University. The first thing that struck us about the hotel was the enormous rooms. I actually got lost in mine between the two bathrooms, the study and the lounge area. Apparently they were all like this – what a hotel!

After a formal dinner with our host Professor Qilin Zhou (Director of the State Key Laboratory of Elemento-organic Chemistry and member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences), most retired to bed but Professor Rawal, Professor Maruoka and I were taken to a live Chinese comedy show. Lots of clapping with plastic clapping hands, much laughter and, of course, all sketches in Chinese. It was a great experience even if we did not understand anything apart from ‘hello’ and ‘thank you’.

The following day started with eager anticipation as an audience in excess of 100 watched Professor Feringa give his final scientific presentation on motors and switches. He was followed by local Professor of Energy, Yun Chen, who spoke about some of his latest research into new nanomaterials for batteries, a key challenge with the ever increasing energy demands around the world. Before lunch, Veronique Gouverneur gave her presentation looking at the latest developments in organofluorine chemistry.

After lunch, the five poster judges took to their duties for one last time with each asked to examine ten posters and select just one. With the final five selected it was left to Professors Feringa and Maruoka to rank the winners. All five received money from the State Key Lab thanks to the generosity of Professor Zhou, plus journal subscriptions and books from the RSC, amongst other things, as additional gifts.

The scope of the meeting then switched to green chemistry as Professor Buxing Han spoke about his latest research using ionic liquids, supercritical fluids and a mixture of the two as solvents for organic reactions. Professor Han was followed by Professor Rawal who gave his third different talk in five days covering his group’s total synthesis of a member of the Welwitindolinone group of natural products. This was a particularly insightful talk as Professor Rawal not only discussed things that worked but also routes that had failed. There was certainly a good lesson here for total synthesis students, namely things may not always work out but perseverance is the key to success.

In the last session of the day, Professor Maruoka spoke about some of his latest results in the field of organocatalysis. He was followed by Zhen Yang who gave a second total synthesis masterclass. The retrosynthetic analysis slides certainly gave me a trip down memory lane and the overall synthesis in 26 steps (micrandilactone) showcased the real power of organic chemistry and the creative thought processes needed to succeed.

After the poster presentations had been made, the speakers and other key faculty members walked to a very famous restaurant called Goubuli for steamed dumplings. They are a local speciality, filled with vegetables, fish and, traditionally, pork. Normally six is enough, but I was proud to exceed the average! The other highlight of the dinner was the stinky tofu, a delicacy providing you can get past the tremendously bad smell, much stronger than the bluest blue cheese. This was a real challenge – the stink was just so bad!

After dinner, the speakers and faculty members retired to a German bar for one last drink to celebrate the day and the past week. Over the course of the seven days we had travelled many thousand of miles, seen 21 scientific talks covering many different aspects of the chemical sciences, with a total audience close to 700 and nearly 200 posters judged. All in all, it was a great week and the only thing left to do is to thank all the speakers and, of course, the local hosts, without whom none of this would have been possible.

Robert Eagling

View the Nankai Symposium schedule

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The 5th ChemComm International Symposium gets underway….

A 5am start was always going to be tough, particularly after such a successful event in Kyoto. That said, with cases packed, we headed to Kansai Airport…. next stop Beijing!

After a three hour flight, the ChemComm International delegation arrived at Beijing International Airport where we had a four hour layover. After lunch, we were joined by the RSC Publisher for China, Dr Daping Zhang, and Professor Keiji Maruoka, the final international speaker for the next two events. The flight to Lanzhou was smooth and, to our delight, we were met by the former director of the Key State Laboratory and member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Professor Yong-Qiang Tu. Following a buffet dinner accompanied by excellent regional red wine, the speakers retired early with one eye on the second symposium. 

Professor Tu opened events and chaired the first session, inviting Professor Xinhe Bao to the stage. Professor Bao gave a beautiful overview on some of his very detailed studies into heterogenous catalysis within nanotubes and other nano-confined systems. Using nobel metals or metals such as iron or nickel, it was shown that the conversation of syngas was much more efficient inside the tube than outside. The subject of the session then switched to metal-free homogenous catalysis, as Professor Maruoka spoke about some of his latest results in the field of organocatalysis. As you would expect, high enatiomeric excesses and yields were the order of the day.

 Following coffee, Professor Veronique Gouverneur gave another whistle-stop tour of her group’s latest organofluorine chemistry and the formation of  C–F bonds using palladium and gold homogenous catalysis.

As in Kyoto, the speakers worked hard over lunch analysing the 80 posters on show. They covered everything from organic methodology, to total synthesis, organic materials and supramolecular chemistry. If they thought judging them was tough in Kyoto, it proved even more so in Lanzhou! Unfortunately, Professor Ben Feringa was unable to act as a judge, because, due to a last minute laptop crisis, his presentation was being transferred to a spare laptop, with his own laptop in pieces, being fixed by helpful student Mr Woo.

After lunch, the conference switched gears to total synthesis. Professor Dawei Ma spoke first about the total synthesis of galbulimima alkaloids and communesins. Professor Ma was followed by Professor Viresh Rawal, who gave a different talk to that described in the programme. Professor Rawal described his recent total synthesis of Pederin and Mycalamide B, both part of the Pederin family of natural products isolated from the beetle Paederus fuscipas. He also introduced initial work looking at bioactivity of Mycalamide in cells, carried out with Milan Mrksich. 

For the final session, the audience were treated to a masterclass from Ben Feringa on molecular motors and switches. This was only made possible by Mr Woo, who had rebuilt his computer, replacing a transistor, and bingo! His synthetic motors, inspired by nature, are unidirectional with the direction controlled by the enantiomer used. By adding legs, the motors can be bound to gold surfaces and then used to change the orientation of liquid crystal films. A great talk and even Professor Bao, the session Chair, could not bring himself to cut it short. Thank goodness for Mr Woo! The final talk of the day was presented by Professor Deqing Zhang on tetrathiafulvalene-based switchable molecular systems towards functional materials. 

The evening social events were as memorable as the science, with the speakers joined by 50 or so guests including the vice Dean of Lanzhou University. The Chinese banquet was enhanced with locally produced red wine and Chinese liquor (only to be drunk in multiples of three – Chinese style…kambai). After many toasts and speeches, the speakers were taken to a local pub for some traditional Chinese music. The night was not done, however, as we then moved to a Tibetan bar. The speakers were told to expect local singing and dancing. Little did they know that they would be involved! After being sung to, each speaker was presented with a white Hada. What a great way to end such a action-packed day.

Next stop Tianjin for the final event of three…..

Robert Eagling