Biomimetic synthesis

Biomimetic synthesis is an area of organic chemical synthesis that is specifically biologically inspired, so-named in 1917 by the English organic chemist and Nobel laureate Sir Robert Robinson. The term encompasses both the testing of a "biogenetic hypothesis" (conjectured course of a biosynthesis in nature) through execution of a series of reactions designed to parallel the proposed biosynthesis, as well as programs of study where a synthetic reaction or reactions aimed at a desired synthetic goal are designed to mimic a one or more known enzymic transformations of an established biosynthetic pathway. The earliest generally cited example of a biomimetic synthesis is Robinson's organic synthesis of the alkaloid tropinone.