Education
- Bachelor of Science, Chemistry, University of California, Los Angeles
- Ph. D., Chemistry, Yale University
Biography
Janis Louie was born and raised in
Professor Louie's research focuses on the discovery and understanding of new reactions catalyzed by transition metal complexes. She has developed a highly active Ni(0) catalyst that effectively mediates a variety of cycloaddition and isomerization reactions. For example, when ligated with electron rich, sterically-hindered N-heterocyclic carbenes, Ni0 facilitates the cycloaddition between unsaturated hydrocarbons (e.g. diynes, enynes) and heterocumulenes (such as CO2 and isocyanates) as well as other derivatives (such as aldehydes, ketones, and nitriles) to afford a variety of substituted heterocycles (such as pyrones, pyridones, pyrans, and pyridines, respectively). In addition, the same catalyst system can be applied for the isomerization of vinyl cyclopropanes and the rearrangement of cyclopropylen-ynes. Importantly, all reactions proceed under extremely mild conditions (room temperature, atmospheric pressures, and short reaction times), require only catalytic amounts of Ni/