Organic electrosynthesis: Catalytic aspects

Organic electrosynthesis can often be described as a catalytic technology because an electrode material, a redox mediator, or a molecular complex governs the rate and selectivity of an organic transformation. This vocabulary is informative only when the catalytic entity, the state to which it is regenerated, and the elementary function it performs are defined quantitatively. This Tutorial Review describes a quantitative framework for reading organic electrosynthesis from a catalytic perspective. It defines thermodynamic, kinetic, mass transport, and synthetic descriptors and shows how they are tied to a mechanistic assignment. Two conceptual distinctions structure the discussion: catalysis at the electrode versus chemical redox catalysis in solution, and electron-/hole-initiated chains versus stoichiometric charge transfer. The descriptions are organized around catalytic functions rather than reaction classes. The aim of this Tutorial is not a survey of reactions, electrode materials or electrolysis cell designs but a quantitative language for designing, comparing, and reporting catalytic organic electrochemical transformations, together with the control experiments that separate kinetic, thermodynamic, mass transport, and deactivation phenomena.