How to excite an organic chemist.

Many organic chemists spend their days searching for creative solutions to real-world problems, yet the media pays them just a fraction of the attention devoted to physicists or biologists. Even fellow scientists think organic chemistry is esoteric.

Ask a group of organic chemists why they love their work, however, and most will tell you that it enables them to make things that no one else has made before. Many spend their days trying to make large, architecturally complex molecules, and some believe that the journey taken to prepare the compound is as important as arriving at the destination. Indeed, chemists are frequently drawn to the field because there is not just one way to solve the problem, and the search can reveal a bit more about how the world works.

When a complex synthesis is first reported at a conference, the excitement can be palpable. The audience can be inspired by the speaker's innovative approach, but there may be another reason for their exhilaration: they might be able to apply the lessons learned from that synthesis to their own research.

An impressive synthesis may be described as 'beautiful' or 'elegant' because of an aesthetic appreciation of the molecule itself or the way it was created. But it often implies that the approach was creative and that the molecule was made efficiently. Because chemists design their syntheses by looking at the target molecule and working backwards towards simpler starting materials, chemists can impress their peers by pursuing strategies no one else noticed, by using original sequences of previously disparate reactions, or by developing new reactions that enable them to construct bonds in an unexpected way.

The work isn't over when the first synthesis of a complex molecule is reported — there is always plenty of room for improvement, and chemists are fired up by the desire to make things better. Second-generation syntheses are often very different from the original, and may have fewer steps or contain new and unexpected chemical reactions. This iterative process is not just an academic exercise: process chemists in pharmaceutical companies are often the unsung heroes of the synthetic world, as they devise incredibly effective syntheses to produce kilogram quantities of potential drugs. By doing so, they save millions of dollars for their companies, and can reduce the environmental impact of the synthesis by minimizing the amounts of waste produced or the quantities of solvents required.

In a similar vein, chemists enjoy finding improved catalysts. Catalysts exist for many reactions but are often expensive, toxic or impractical for anything other than simple molecules. By exploring the chemical mechanism of the catalyst, or perhaps by just plain luck, chemists can develop second- and third-generation catalysts that dramatically outperform the first-generation system. This can be invaluable both in the lab and for improving industrial processes.

A common misconception is that organic chemists now have a complete 'toolbox' of reactions that can be applied to any synthesis. But the toolbox is certainly not full; many desirable reactions remain elusive. This is especially true in the area known as 'asymmetric catalysis', which involves the creation of a chiral material from a non-chiral substrate — molecules can exist in left-hand and right-hand forms, and the development of catalysts that can selectively make one of the two forms is a major challenge in the field. To outsiders, this is a particularly obscure field of work, but the inherent challenges involved attract vast numbers of researchers. Furthermore, the products of these reactions have enormous potential utility, as small-molecule tools that can tease apart a complex biological system, or as lead compounds that can be developed into the next 'blockbuster' drug. Without asymmetric synthesis, some hugely successful drugs — such as AZT for HIV/AIDS, or lovastatin, which reduces cholesterol — would be extremely difficult to make.

Today, a novice organic chemist is like a child in a sweetshop. There are many 'hot' areas to work on: 'green' chemistry, which seeks ways to eliminate environmentally harmful chemicals from common processes; the burgeoning area of nanotechnology, constructing minuscule components for a future age of molecular devices; or maybe just pushing the boundaries of chemical space, by concentrating on a single element such as boron and seeing what chemistry can be developed. The modern world requires medicines, agrochemicals and advanced materials, and it is chemists who must provide these. Far from being esoteric, organic chemistry serves global needs.

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