Five decades of mechanistic and exploratory organic photochemistry

Abstract

This exposition summarizes a personal perspective on past and current developments in organic photochemistry. It comprises three portions. The first section describes the beginnings of our photochemical studies and how it was possible to relate photochemical reactivity to excited-state electronic structures. The second selectively relates some of the reactions and concepts developed in the intermediate years. Finally, the third portion describes our recent research. © 2006 IUPAC.