The Goeppert Mayer Gauge
*The* podcast about light-matter interaction! Jay and Dugan host this monthly podcast about chemistry and physics with a focus on the variety of ways in which scientists study and take advantage of interactions between light and matter.
The Goeppert Mayer Gauge
Episode 15: Photocycloaddition
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Season 3
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Episode 3
We're celebrating Dugan's recent JACS paper on copper-catalyzed photocycloaddition reactions by doing a Back 2 Basics episode on photocycloadditons that is really just an episode on that paper with a little bit of Woodward Hoffmann rules thrown in for good measure. But what is a podcast for besides self-promotion anyway? We return to some of our favorite topics, including X-ray spectroscopy and transient absorption, and discuss how a combination of spectroscopic techniques can be used to deduce photochemical reaction mechanisms involving transition metals. We also ask ourselves how a single methylene group can drastically change the fate of a molecule and how a single pandemic can drastically change the fate of a research project.