Which solvent should I choose ?

Today’s posting is going to cater more towards the process chemists out there.  I remember plenty of times, where I was given a procedure to work on and there were improvements to be made before it was scaled up or improvements needed to be made because there was an unfavourable facet to the reaction (such as the reagent, the solvent, etc.).  I remember having a list of accepted solvents that if I was going to improve a reaction and replace the solvent, I would consult that list.   Sometimes, you even wish that your Discovery group would have a sense of the acceptability of some solvents over others.  Don’t suggest to me to use carbon tetrachloride, benzene or (fill in the blank) in that reaction that needs to be scale-up.  I must give kudos to the colleagues at GSK for publishing this article in Green Chemistry entitled “Expanding GSK’s solvent selection…