Chemical glycosylations are perhaps the most important reactions in glycoscience, but the mechanisms are not well understood. Here, quantum chemical calculations combined with natural-abundance NMR measurements of 13C kinetic isotope effects reveal both associative and dissociative mechanisms at the extremes of a continuum that depends on the relative stereochemistry of the substrate and the anomeric configuration of the product.
- Min Huang
- Graham E. Garrett
- David Crich
