Photocatalytic strategies for the activation of organic chlorides

Driven by the continuous demand for sustainable organic synthesis, the field of photocatalysis has emerged as a powerful manifold for direct modification of various chemical compounds. Organic chlorides have not been typically considered as attractive synthetic precursors for these reactions due to their chemical inertness, however, this situation is now rapidly changing. The past five years have witnessed a growing interest in exploring organic chlorides as cheap, readily available and bench-stable substrates for photocatalytic transformations and a number of protocols have already been reported. This Review Article summarises the conceptual ideas behind the developed methods and presents them in the form of synthetic strategies based on how light energy is accumulated in the catalytic system or the way bond energy in the substrate is reduced. The synthetic application of each strategy is also discussed. Organochlorides are attractive building blocks for photocatalytic synthesis that have been receiving increasing attention lately, thanks to recent methodological advances that overcome their inertness. In this Review Article, Giedyk and colleagues summarise the developments and strategies for their photocatalytic activation.