Using light to push stereochemistry uphill
By 
Mason Wakley2026-04-23T13:51:00
While chemistry usually follows the downhill pull of thermodynamics, Alison Wendlandt is creating higher‑energy stereoisomers in the final stages of synthesis
Alison Wendlandt describes her work as sitting in the overlap of a Venn diagram. In one circle are stereochemical editing reactions that, for example, flip the handedness of a specific chiral centre. In the other are reactions that give products that are ‘contra-thermodynamic’, or higher in energy than the alternative stereoisomer. Her group coined the term ‘contra‑thermodynamic stereochemical editing’ in 2022 to capture this intersection of the two ideas, though she notes that a few similar methods existed before then.
‘The way that we view stereochemical editing is as a kind of complementary synthetic logic,’ Wendlandt says. Rather than building in 3D geometry while creating the molecular backbone itself, she develops tools that allow her to fine-tune stereochemistry in the later stages of synthesis. This can reduce the number of steps to synthesise certain stereoisomers or unlock previously unobtained configurations.