I am in the process of revising my annual lecture to first year university students on the topic of “curly arrows”. I like to start my story in 1924, when Robert Robinson published the very first example[1] as an illustration of why nitrosobenzene undergoes electrophilic bromination in the para position of the benzene ring. I follow this up by showing how “data mining” can be used to see if this supports his assertion. I have used the very latest version of the CSD crystal structure database to update the version originally posted here in 2020.[2]
References
- "Forthcoming events", Journal of the Society of Chemical Industry, vol. 43, pp. 1295-1298, 1924. https://doi.org/10.1002/jctb.5000435208
- H. Rzepa, "The first ever curly arrows. Revisited with some crystal structure mining.", 2020. https://doi.org/10.59350/c6thp-wqe69