A home-made photochemistry robot could significantly advance the field of organic (photo)chemistry with rapid yield optimisation, easy scale-up and reliable reproducibility studies, an Amsterdam-based group reports in Science.

Photochemistry is a promising but still relatively young field that aims to use light to catalyse chemical reactions. As a result, photochemists still have many problems to solve. Combining it with flow chemistry, another relative newcomer, has already made great strides. But there are still difficulties: optimisation, reproducibility and scale-up are three major challenges. With RoboChem, Aidan Slattery, Timothy Noël and colleagues at the University of Amsterdam are killing these three birds with one stone.