Research in the group is focused on enantioselective homogeneous catalysis and heterogeneous catalysis of electrochemical reactions in fuel cells. Enantioselective homogeneous catalysis occurs in solution where a prochiral substrate is preferentially transformed into one enantiomer of a chiral product by a small amount (typically 0.1%) of a chiral catalyst. Enantioselective catalysis is the most efficient method to produce chiral molecules, and is of major interest to the production of pharmaceuticals. Research in the group on enantioselective catalysis includes design, synthesis, and study of new chiral transition metal catalysts; elucidation of mechanisms of enantioselective catalytic transformations using isotope substitution, kinetics, and low temperature NMR; and preparation of highly reusable polymeric catalysts by ring opening olefin metathesis polymerization (ROMP).
