Photocatalysts

New Iridium’s powerful photocatalysis platform consists of three classes of high-performance organic photocatalysts (PCs):

• Phenoxazines (Phenox O-PC^™)
• Dihydrophenazines (PhenN O-PC^™)
• Benzoperylenes (Birch O-PC^™)

Organic PCs are the key enabling component of photocatalysis technology that is fueling the next wave of chemical innovation by using light to activate reactions, as opposed to heat as in conventional methods. Unique single-electron radical chemistry accessed via light absorption, and typically conducted at room temperature, enables new reactivity and unprecedented process efficiencies in chemical manufacturing such as:

• Substituting lower-cost raw materials
• Requiring fewer synthetic steps
• Producing less waste and consuming less energy

New Iridium’s organic PCs are designed by quantum simulations (DFT) to optimize properties critical for high-performance. Possessing long excited lifetimes, redox reversibility, and tunable redox potentials they resolve many limitations of earlier generations. These next-generation organic PCs provide sustainable alternatives to iridium- and ruthenium-based PCs and can easily scale to meet industrial demand.

The growing list of applications for our photocatalysis platform includes the following reactions:

• Aryl cross-couplings (C-N, C-S, C-O and C-C)
• Birch reductions
• Atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP)
• Ring-opening polymerization
• Radical substitution/ addition on vinyl or aromatic groups (e.g., trifluoromethylation)
• Decarboxylative olefination
• Dehalogenation
• Solar fuel generation (e.g., CO₂ to methane conversion)