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Photoredox cycling during UV irradiation of ferrocyanide ([FeII(CN)6]4-) in the presence of stoichiometric sulfite (SO32-) is shown to be an extremely effective way to drive the reductive homologation of hydrogen cyanide (HCN) to simple sugars and precursors of hydroxy acids and amino acids.

Biophysical studies of ligand interactions with three human telomeric repeat sequences (d(AGGG(TTAGGG)n, n = 3, 7 and 11)) show that an oxazole-based 'click' ligand, which induces parallel folded quadruplexes, preferentially stabilises longer telomeric repeats providing evidence for selectivity in binding at the interface between tandem quadruplex motifs.

A synthetic approach towards the structurally complex dimer, kingianin A is reported. The strategy involved a cascade of complexity generating reactions, inspired through biosynthetic speculation. A concise protecting group free synthesis of the proposed monomeric precursor pre-kingianin A has been achieved using a tandem Stille cross-coupling reaction and electrocyclisation process. However, preliminary studies of the key dimerisation reaction have been conducted, which indicate that the process is not spontaneous, raising questions as to the origin of this complex natural product., (This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2011)

Described is the first modular construction of a G-quadruplex chiral catalyst. The key objective was to use G-quadruplex structures to act as chiral ligands that would allow access to either enantiomer of the product of a Diels-Alder reaction.

Conditions are reported for the facile, high-yielding coupling of acyl chlorides with terminal alkynes in a reaction involving palladium and copper iodide; the reaction is tolerant of a wide variety of acyl chlorides and terminal alkynes and provides a convenient one-pot route to acetylenic ketones.