TROWBRIDGE GROUP
RESEARCH THEMES
Primary Areas of Research in the Trowbridge Group
Molecular Oxygen Editing
The development of molecular editing platforms, the process by which single atoms can be inserted or deleted selectively in or around a molecule’s skeleton, would be potentially transformative to synthetic chemists across industry and academia due their operational efficiency, high atom economy, and reduced overall waste.
By exploiting underexplored reactive, low-valent oxygen intermediates - such as monoatomic atomic (oxene) - generated by visible light, in combination with new reagent design, our laboratory is focused on developing novel transformations for the late-stage oxygen editing of complex molecules.
Sustainable Photocatalysis
Over the last decade, photoredox catalysis has come to the forefront of modern organic synthesis, providing a powerful platform upon which to build molecular complexity via previously elusive bond disconnections.
However, many photochemical reactions rely on the use of rare-earth transition metals and high energy blue light, rendering them costly, poorly sustainable, and difficult to scale. Our laboratory is interested in the development of new photocatalytic platforms that exploit more sustainable elements in combination with red light.
Microenvironment Mapping
In biology, the physical proximity of biomolecules and their resulting molecular interactions dictate
many aspects of intracellular function such as cell signalling, adhesion, recognition, and transport.
Classical catalytic-based approaches towards understanding proximity rely on enzymes tethered to the protein of interest that activate warhead-tags that covalently label the proximal molecules (HRP, APEX, BioID).
Recently, blue light-activated photocatalysts have been shown to activate diazirine-tags via Dexter Energy Transfer, which label the proximal molecules with greater resolution (µMap).
Our research is focused on developing novel targeting modalities and photocatalyst/warhead probes to discover new proximity gated biological interactions.