Introduction

Dr. Huiying Zeng received B.S. degree in college of chemistry and chemical Engineering, Hunan Normal University in 2003. He received Ph.D. degree in the State Key Laboratory Elemento-organic Chemistry, Nankai University in 2013, where he studied total synthesis of nature products. He did postdoctoral research in Green Chemistry at McGill University (Canada) in the group of Prof. Chao-Jun Li from 2013 to 2015. He won the Merit Postdoctoral Fellowship (Canada) in 2013-2014. He has been an associate professor at the State Key Laboratory Applied Chemistry, Lanzhou University since 2016.

His research interests are mainly focused on catalytic conversion of lignin and related model compounds into aromatic compounds, exploring photo-induced transition metal and photosensitizer free new chemical reaction.

Representative Publications

1.“Dearomatization-Rearomatization Strategy for Reductive Cross-Coupling of Indoles with Ketones in Water”Wang, Z.; Zeng, H.*; Li, C.-J.* Org. Lett. 2019, 21, 2302-2306.

2.“Photoinduced Transition-Metal-Free Cross-Coupling of Aryl Halides with H-Phosphonates”Zeng, H.*; Dou, Q.; Li, C.-J.* Org. Lett. 2019, 21, 1301-1305.

3.““Two-in-One” Strategy for Palladium-Catalyzed C–H Functionalization in Water”Zeng, H.*; Wang, Z.; Li, C.-J.* Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2019, 58, 2859-2863.

4.“Hydrogen Bonding Promoted Simple and Clean Photo-Induced Reduction of C–X Bond with Isopropanol”Cao, D.; Yan, C.; Zhou, P.; Zeng, H.*; Li, C.-J.* Chem. Common. 2019, 55, 767-770.

5.“Palladium-Catalyzed Formal Cross-Coupling of Diaryl Ethers with Amines: Slicing the 4-O-5 Linkage in Lignin Models”Zeng, H.*; Cao, D.; Qiu, Z.; Li, C.-J.* Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2018, 57, 3752-3757.

6.“Formal Cross-Coupling of Diaryl Ethers with Ammonia by Dual C(Ar)−O Bond Cleavages” Cao, D.; Zeng, H.*; Li, C.-J.* ACS Catal. 2018, 8, 8873-8878.

7“An Adventure in Sustainable Cross-Coupling of Phenols and Derivatives via Carbon−Oxygen Bond Cleavage”Zeng, H.*; Qiu, Z.; Dominguez-Huerta, A.; Hearne, Z.; Chen, Z.; Li, C.-J.* ACS Catal. 2017, 7, 510-519.

8.“C–C Bond Formation by Oxidative Ring-Opening Homocoupling of Cyclobutanols” Zeng, H.*; Pan, P.; Chen, J.; Gong, H. *; Li, C.-J.* Eur. J. Org. Chem. 2017, 1070-1073.

9.“Biomimetic Total Synthesis of 6a,7,8,9,10,10a-Hexahydro-3,6,9-trimethyl-6-(4- methylpent-3-en-1-yl)-1,9-epoxy-6H-dibenzo-[b,d]pyran and Its Diastereoisomer”Zeng, H.*; Duan, D.; Tang, B. Synlett 2015, 26, 927-930.

10.“Direct Cross-Coupling of Phenols with Amines”Chen, Z.^#; Zeng, H.^#; Girard, S. A.; Wang, F.; Chen, N.; Li, C.-J.* Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2015, 54, 14487-14491. (^# C. Z. and Z. H. contributed equally; It was chosen as “Hot Paper” by Angew. Chem. Int. Ed.; News story describing this work was highlighted in Chem. & Eng. News 2015, 93(45), 31 and Synfacts 2016, 12(2): 0205.)

11.“A Complete Switch of the Directional Selectivity in the Annulation of 2-Hydroxybenzaldehydes with Alkynes”Zeng, H.; Li, C.-J.* Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2014, 53, 13862-13865. (It was chosen as “Hot Paper” by Angew. Chem. Int. Ed.; News story describing this work was highlighted in Chem. & Eng. News 2014, 92(44), 41 and ChemCatChem 2015, 7, 574–576.)

Representative Publications