Finding Opportunities from Surprises and Failures. Development of Rhodium-Stabilized Donor/Acceptor Carbenes and Their Application to Catalyst-Controlled C-H Functionalization.

Catalyst-controlled C-H functionalization by means of the C-H insertion chemistry of rhodium carbenes has become a powerful synthetic method. The key requirements for the development of this chemistry are donor/acceptor carbenes and the chiral dirhodium tetracarboxylate catalysts. This perspective will describe the stages involved in developing this chemistry and illustrate the scope of the donor/acceptor carbene C-H functionalization.