Oxidation reactions are a cornerstone of chemical synthesis, enabling medicinal chemists to functionalize molecules in lower oxidation states while protecting them from unintended transformations. Yet, the safety risks associated with oxidants often lead chemists to prefer other types of reactions for large-scale manufacturing. However, there are times when oxidation reactions are unavoidable and must be executed at a scale. In some situations, the reactions even present immediate synthetic advantages and achieve desired short-term benefits, such as material generation.
When an oxidation reaction is needed, chemists can choose from a wide range of methods, such as peroxides, photochemical oxidations, or metal-mediated oxidations like KMnO4,CrO2Cl2,OsO4, and periodate chemistry.
The reactions achieve similar transformations, but ozonolysis remains highly attractive because of its atom efficiency and clean reaction profile.
