Fort Group Research
The Fort laboratory explores the unique reactivity of aromatic compounds to investigate potential uses for future applications such as electronic devices, polymers with enhanced properties, and ligands for catalysis.
Currently the primary research in the Fort lab focuses on analogs of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) containing one or more boron-nitrogen (BN) bonds in their skeleton. These molecules are isosteres of the PAHs (structurally identical, but containing non-identical atoms). New discoveries in the reactivity and properties of these unique systems could lead to advancements in materials science, biology, and electronics. This project attempts to lay the groundwork for future applications by uncovering unique and useful reactivity gained by the inclusion of a BN bond into the molecules. Using both theory and experiement this works seeks to involve undergraduate researchers in unique aspects of computational chemistry and synthetic organic chemistry.
If you would like more information on this research or joining the Fort Laboratory, please contact Dr. Fort at ehfort@stthomas.edu
Recent Publications:
Fort, E. H.; Scott, L. T. “Growing Carbon Nanotubes from Short Hydrocarbon Templates. Energetic Analysis of the Diels-Alder Cycloaddition/Rearomatization Strategy.”J. Mat. Chem. 2011, 21, 1378-1381. Featured on Journal Cover
Fort, E. H.; Scott, L. T. “Gas-Phase Diels-Alder Cycloaddition of Benzyne to an Aromatic Hydrocarbon Bay Region:Groundwork for the Selective Solvent-Free Growth of Armchair Carbon Nanotubes”Tet. Lett. 2011, 52, 2051-2053.
Fort, E. H.; Scott, L. T. “One-Step Conversion of Aromatic Hydrocarbon Bay Regions Into New Unsubstituted Benzene Rings. A Reagent for the Low-Temperature, Metal-Free Growth of Single-Chirality Carbon Nanotubes.” Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2010, 49, 6626-6628.
Featured in Article: Synfacts, 2010, I 1244. DOI: 10.1055/s-0030-1258731
Fort, E. H.; Donovan, P. M.; Scott, L. T. “Diels-Alder Reactivity of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon Bay Regions: Implications for Metal-Free Growth of Single-Chirality Carbon Nanotubes.” J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2009, 131, 16006-16007.
Featured in Articles: Nature Chemistry 2009. doi:10.1038/nchem.464
Nature Nanotechnology 2010, 5, 103-104. doi:10.1038/nnano.2010.9
Synfacts, 2010, 2, 175. doi:10.1038/nnano.2010.9
Scott, L. T. and Fort, E. H. “Chemical Synthesis of Carbon Nantobues.” U. S. Patent Application 61/226,211