A highly efficient Cu-catalyzed C-O bond-forming reaction of alcohol and aryl bromides has been developed. This transformation was realized through the use of copper(I) iodide as a catalyst, 8-hydroxyquinoline as a ligand, and K(3)PO(4) as a base. A variety of functionalized substrates were found to react under these reaction conditions to provide products in good to excellent yields.

Two GFP analogues o-HBDI and o-HBMO have been designed and synthesized. The former shows no fluorescence while the latter shows strong fluorescence due to the formation of an intramolecular hydrogen-bond. At low temperatures, both molecules have strong fluorescence.

A synthetic green fluorescent protein analogue showed Zn 2+ -induced fluorescence in organic solvents (Φ = 0.07 at r.t. and up to 0.3 at low temperature). The experimental observations and theoretical calculations suggest that Zn 2+ binding inhibits the free rotation of an aryl-alkene bond, which allows