Lecture Scehdule

Theme：The Science of Organic Synthesis

Speaker：Professor Henry N.C. Wong

Date：15:00 on March 30th (Monday)

Live-broadcasting Platform：Zoom

https://cuhksz.zoom.com.cn/j/544357564

Meeting ID：544 357 564

Language：English

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Speaker Profile

                                                                                          Professor Henry N.C. Wong

Professor Henry N.C. Wong is currently Head of New Asia College, Emeritus Professor of Chemistry, and Research Professor at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. He was ProVice-Chancellor/Vice-President for Research of the University from 2009 to 2013, and Dean of Science from 2012 to 2018. 

The research areas of Professor Wong are in organic syntheses of natural and non-natural molecules. Professor Wong has published more than 260 research papers, invited reviews and book chapters.  He also presented more than 60 plenary and invited lectures in international symposia and conferences, and serves as editorial and advisory board members of many international journals. In addition, Professor Wong proactively contributes to the development of scientific research on the mainland. He is the Chairman of the Management Committee, Shanghai-Hong Kong Joint Laboratory in Chemical Synthesis, Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, The Chinese Academy of Sciences.  He is also Guest Professor and Honorary Professor of many mainland universities.

To recognise his contributions, Professor Wong has received many honours, including D.Sc. from University of London (1994), 2nd Class National Natural Science Prize of China (1997) and Croucher Senior Research Fellowship (1999). He is also Member of The Chinese Academy of Sciences (1999) and Fellow of The World Academy of Sciences for the advancement of science in developing countries (2004). Professor Wong was elected Founding Member of The Hong Kong Academy of Sciences in 2015. 

Abstract

This talk will centre around various aspects of organic synthesis as a science. First, constraints and scope of organic synthesis will be given. Then, discussion will be mainly on the speaker’s own research works carried out in Hong Kong and Shanghai, which include the synthesis and studies of hydroxytetraphenylenes, iron-catalyzed cross-coupling reactions employing organolithium compounds, and natural products synthesis. 

The total synthesis of cryptotrione, isolated from the bark of C. japonica (Japanese cedar) and featuring a unique 5-membered spiro-ring fused with a cyclopropane, will be presented in detail to showcase the difficulties involved in total synthesis of structurally complex naturally occurring molecules. Furthermore, progresses on some on-going projects, such as chiral recognition of fullerene C76, and isolation of the specific receptor protein from soybean leaves responsible for the hypersensitive defense response (HR) to cause localized cell death and accumulation of antimicrobial phytoalexins, will be presented. In the conclusion, some grand challenges for synthetic organic chemists, as well as the future of organic synthesis will be delineated.