Nature provides a huge variety of complex chemical compounds, some of which (or their analogues) have found major applications in medicine, agriculture or more generally in biology. In medicine, antibiotics (e.g. penicillins), anticancer drugs (e.g. taxol), immunosuppressants (e.g. cyclosporin), anti-inflammatory drugs (e.g. steroid hormones) or painkillers (e.g. morphine), or alkaloids acting on the nervous system (e.g. atropine) can be cited as examples. In agrochemistry too, small molecules have had major applications such as chrysanthemic acid, which led to many insecticides.
Because of their complexity, their total or partial synthesis poses a constant challenge to the organic chemists and pushes them to continually refine their arsenal of reactions. This vast field offers many opportunities for research internships. The internships can be carried out either in the laboratories of École Polytechnique, or in other university or industrial laboratories, in France or abroad.
Examples of internships offered in the Laboratory of Organic Synthesis (LSO)
The laboratory is interested in the development of new reactions and the total synthesis of natural products or medicinal products with various biological activities.
- Total synthesis of natural products of biological and medicinal interest
- Chemistry of heterocycles
- Synthesis of photoactivable molecules for biological applications
- New transformations into radical chemistry
- New reactions applicable to the synthesis of valuable compounds: new transformations of cyclopropanes, chemistry of titanium organic complexes, multicomponent reactions, palladium-catalyzed cycloadditions, radical reactions and their application in synthesis
Course language: French or English
ECTS: 20
- Profesor: Nay Bastien
- Profesor: Zard Samir