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Updated: May 22, 2025

Light-driven Enzymatic Decarboxylation
Published on: May 22, 2016
Mechanistic Insight into the Photoinduced Decarboxylative Radical Addition of Carboxylic Acid to Alkenes in a
Toshiki Furutani1,2, Yasunori Matsui3,4, Ryoga Hashimoto1
1Department of Applied Chemistry and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Engineering, University of Fukui, 3-9-1 Bunkyo, Fukui 910-8507, Japan.
Abstract:
The detailed mechanism of photoinduced decarboxylative radical addition to alkenes using both the effect of an electron donor (ED)/electron acceptor (EA) and laser flash photolysis in a two-molecule photoredox system was investigated. The concentration of EA•- played an important role in the photoreaction and could be controlled by varying the concentrations of ED/EA and their identity, which influenced ΔGPET. Higher concentrations of ED/EA and a larger negative ΔGPET led to a higher concentration of EA•-, thereby increasing the yield of the adduct; however, the large negative ΔGPET for the generation of the EDA complex hindered decarboxylation. The two-molecule photoredox system is simple and can be easily tuned by adjusting the concentrations and type (ΔGPET) of ED/EA through a simple replacement of ED/EA, which is easier than modulating the oxidation/reduction potential in one-molecule photoredox systems.
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