Modern Physical Organic Chemistry

"The twentieth century saw the birth of physical organic chemistry - the study of the interrelationships between structure and reactivity in organic molecules - and the discipline matured to a brilliant and vibrant field. Some would argue that the last century also saw the near death of the field. In our opinion, physical organic chemistry is alive and well in the early twenty-first century. New life has been breathed into the field because it has embraced newer chemical disciplines, such as bioorganic, organometallic, materials, and supramolecular chemistries. These newer disciplines have given physical organic chemists fertile ground in which to study the interrelationships of structure and reactivity. Yet, even while these new fields have been developing, remarkable advances in our understanding of basic organic chemical reactivity have continued to appear, exploiting classical physical organic tools and developing newer experimental and computational techniques. Importantly, the techniques of physical organic chemistry and the intellectual approach to problems embodied by the discipline remain as relevant as ever to organic chemistry. Therefore, a course in physical organic chemistry will be essential for students for the foreseeable future. This book is meant to capture the state of the art of physical organic chemistry in the early twenty-first century, and, within the best of our ability, to present material that will remain relevant as the field evolves in the future. A student must know the fundamentals, such as the essence of structure and bonding in organic molecules, the nature of the basic reactive intermediates, and organic reaction mechanisms. However, students should also have an appreciation of the current issues and challenges in the field, so that when they inspect the modern literature they will have the necessary background to read and understand current research efforts. Therefore, while treating the fundamentals, we have wherever possible chosen examples and highlights from modern research areas."--adapted from Preface, page xxiii.