Synthesis of Deuterated Compounds by Flow Chemistry

Development of the efficient and practical method for the synthesis of deuterated compounds which occupies the broadest area among stable isotopes is one of the most essential issues toward the industrial advance and building a sustainable society. This review describes recent advances in deuteration reactions, where the continuous flow chemistry plays pivotal roles for the successful installation of deuterium atom into diverse organic frameworks, opening new fields of isotope-based synthetic chemistry. In this review, research activity of heterogeneous catalytic, electrolytic, and homogeneous continuous flow deuteration reactions are depicted. High energy efficiency, practicality, and scalability nature inherently possessed by continuous flow protocol exhibits sufficient isotopic enrichment of organic molecules and the extension of their applications, being in stark contrast to the conventional energy-intensive batch system. image