(84bh) High-Throughput Screening of Electrosynthetic Reactions Enabled By Wireless Electrochemical Cell

Electrochemical synthesis has recently emerged as an environmentally benign method for synthesizing value-added fine chemicals. Its unique reactivity has attracted significant interests of synthetic chemists to develop new redox chemistries. However, compared to conventional chemistry, the increased complexity caused by electrode materials, supporting electrolytes, and setup configurations create obstacles for efficient reaction discovery and optimization. One major challenge hindering the development of high-throughput screening (HTS) techniques is that electrochemistry requires electrical connections into the electrolyte to allow external power supply to drive the reaction. This requirement significantly complicates the design of HTS devices for electrosynthesis and limits the corresponding throughput of the system. In this talk, we will present a concept of utilizing wireless power transfer technology to drive electrochemical reactions without direct wire connections. This is enabled by the inductive coupling mechanism, allowing electricity to transfer between coils wirelessly. The coil inside the reacting electrolyte is protected by a miniaturized chemical resistant chassis, and electrodes of different materials can be securely connected with the coil. This conceptual design can significantly simplify the preparation procedure to start an electrochemical reaction. We demonstrated this design with several recently developed electrosynthetic reactions. In addition, we built a fully automated robotic system with 4-channel wireless electrochemical cells to show that this design is HTS-friendly.