Chemoenzymatic Synthesis and Application

Dear colleagues,

The chemo-enzymatic processes are very important in the field of applied catalysis.

They are multistep reaction sequences, where biocatalytic reactions are combined with other transformations, providing very efficient tools in preparative organic synthesis and materials chemistry. In biocatalytic reactions, the enzymes responsible for the cell metabolism are used by organic chemists to accomplish extremely selective and specific chemical transformations in milder conditions of pH and temperature, which are often difficult to achieve by conventional routes.

Biocatalytic processes have in fact received increasing attention among environmentally-friendly synthetic approaches, either for laboratory scale syntheses and for industrial productions, by avoiding some drawbacks of other synthetic approaches, such as high costs, the toxicity of reagents, harsh conditions, and side product formation. In many research programs of public and private research institutions, chemoenzymatic processes have been studied in the last decades for the synthesis of renewable molecules derived from biomass, for the preparation of new bio-based monomers/additives and new value-added features for polymers and materials.

Moreover, in chemo-enzymatic processes, the biocatalytic step can be an asymmetric reaction that allows the formation of new chemical bonds in a stereocontrolled manner, which is an important challenge in the preparation of strategic enantiopure building blocks for the pharmaceutical industry. Chirality in fact is extremely important for the safety and efficiency of drugs, because their biological effects strongly depend on the interaction with the receptors in different parts of the body. Chemo-enzymatic synthesis can be performed either by isolated enzymes that are sometimes more stable, specific and minimize byproduct formation, or by using whole cells (wild-type or recombinant biocatalysts) that have internal cofactor regeneration systems that work as a perfect cheap and green chemical factory. Miming the biochemical pathways in cells, some chemo-enzymatic processes can be performed by coupling sequential reactions catalyzed by different enzymatic consortia, where biotransformations can also be used for the regeneration of costly cofactors, or to enable thermodynamically unfavorable steps in cascade processes, without isolation of the intermediates, and often avoiding protective group chemistry.

This Special Issue will publish full original papers, review articles, and short communications focusing on novel chemo-enzymatic approaches (also enantioselective) as valuable processes for the preparation of fine chemicals, chiral building blocks, or highly functionalized molecules, even on a large scale. Sustainable methodologies from the combination of biocatalysis and different areas of (transition) metal-, organo-, photoredox-catalysis, also using unconventional environmentally-friendly reaction media are also of great interest.

Dr. Paola Vitale
Guest Editor

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