Know Your Next Move

Figure 1. The scans that explain it all. (Taken from Ref. [1]).

The cognitive understanding of how someone solves a problem is a fascinating question. This SCIENCE paper serves as a nice example. The investigators used MRI to study the cognitive properties of Shogi players. [1] Shogi is a type of Japanese chess game. It was known that master chess players tend a have strong ‘pattern recognition’ ability in these games [2]. Since these expert players are very sensitive to the different patterns on the chess board, they have a better prospect of deciding the best ‘next move’.

The reason why I am interested is because there is often an analogy between playing chess and planning in organic synthesis. This is really the ‘problem-solving skill required by an organic chemist. Professor Corey’s ‘Retrosynthetic Analysis’ [3], for which he was awarded a Nobel Prize, represents an extremely logical way to look at a hard synthetic problem. In essence we start from the target molecule and ask the question, ‘how can we lead from a simpler X to this target molecule?’ When we have found out the identity of X, we repeat the question iteratively until it reaches a final X, for which the chemical structure is simple enough. Every time we ask the question, we are ‘deciding on our next move’ as in the game of chess. Indeed, there are good computer algorithms for retrosynthetic planning.

What intrigues me is the cognitive properties behind this engagement – why do certain ‘total synthesis gurus’ can devise neat and effective methods, or even ingenious cascade reactions to the seemingly insurmountable targets, while others struggle on pieces of papers and seems to get to nowhere?

As in the cases for chess and shogi, are some form of ‘pattern recognition’ mechanisms operating in those synthetic masterminds’ situations? To the best of my knowledge this sounds like a relatively unexplored area and the implications will be extremely interesting!

References:

1. The Neural Basis of Intuitive Best Next-Move Generation in Board Game Experts
Xiaohong Wan
Science Vol. 331 no. 6015 pp. 341-346
DOI: 10.1126/science.1194732

2. Instant Notes in Cognitive Psychology P.117
Jackie Andrade, Jon May
Taylor & Francis

3. The Logic of Chemical Synthesis
E. J. Corey, Xue-Min Cheng
Wiley-Blackwell