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Organic Pericyclic Reactions

Five second year lectures by Henry Rzepa (rzepa@imperial.ac.uk, Room 169, C2)
Department of Chemistry, Imperial College London.

DOI: http://doi.org/10042/a3uxp
Podcasts: iTunes or RSS
eBook for iPhone/iPad eBook for Kindle
iTunesU for iPad† iTunesU for Desktop
Blog-stories‡
Other texts:
  1. "Organic Reactions and Orbital Symmetry", T. L. Gilchrist and R. C. Storr, 2nd Ed., CUP 1978, contains many examples of all kinds of pericyclic reactions together with theoretical explanations. The book is out of print, and difficult to get hold of nowadays.
  2. An OUP Primer "Pericyclic Reactions" by Ian Fleming (1998) is an excellent revision text: ISBN 0-19-850307-5, £16.99
  3. "Pericyclic Reactions- a Textbook", by S. Sankaraman, Wiley-VCH, 2005. ISBN 3527314393. Contains many examples.
  4. An article published in J. Chem. Education (2007) telling a synoptic story in this area (DOI: 10.1021/ed084p1535)
  5. The original, and still readable, reviews by Woodward and Hoffmann (DOI: 10.1021/ar50001a003 or 10.1002/anie.196907811)
  6. A short 200 year perspective on WH's impact on organic chemistry

The lectures are based on the material here rather than the texts above. These pages also contain more than 60 molecules/transition states models and animations, which can be viewed on Desktop-type Web browsers (Firefox (26), Safari (7) or Chrome (32). Internet Explorer 8/9 is not compatible) or Tablets (see tablet project).

‡Sections marked contain expanded stories in the form of a blog, and may be consulted for background. Other fun and games can be found flat-packed, as a Valentine Special, the height of fashion, as 3D-printed objects (order here) or as a Möbius race-track. This material is not examinable. †iTunesU material can also be loaded on Android devices.

Copyright (c) Henry S. Rzepa, 1978-2014.