Karl Barry Sharpless

Karl Barry Sharpless is an American chemist whose work advanced asymmetric catalysis and click chemistry. He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2001 and 2022.

Asymmetric catalysis: Catalysis that favors formation of one stereoisomer over another. Sharpless’s early research helped establish practical catalytic methods for making molecules with controlled chirality.
Sharpless epoxidation: An enantioselective oxidation of allylic alcohols that produces chiral epoxides. This landmark reaction exemplifies Sharpless’s use of catalysts to control molecular handedness.
M. G. Finn: An American chemist whose research helped establish and develop click chemistry. Finn coauthored the influential 2001 paper that introduced click chemistry as a general strategy.
Scripps Research: A nonprofit biomedical research institute in La Jolla, California. Sharpless led research groups there during the development of major asymmetric and click-chemistry advances.
Enzymatic catalysis: Catalysis by biological molecules, usually proteins, that accelerate specific chemical reactions. Sharpless’s small-molecule catalysts offer a synthetic complement to enzymes’ natural selectivity.
Click chemistry: A family of reactions that efficiently joins molecular building blocks under mild, selective conditions. Sharpless introduced the term and helped define its guiding principles.
Sharpless asymmetric dihydroxylation: A catalytic reaction that converts alkenes into enantioenriched vicinal diols. It extends asymmetric oxidation to a different functional-group transformation.
Hartmuth C. Kolb: A chemist who helped develop click chemistry and its applications in molecular synthesis. Kolb worked with Sharpless and Finn to articulate the click-chemistry concept.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology: A private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Sharpless held a faculty position at MIT before moving to Stanford and later Scripps.
Organocatalysis: Catalysis by small organic molecules that contain no metal atom. It provides a contrasting route to asymmetric catalysis without the metal complexes central to much of Sharpless’s work.

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