Irradiation of Pummerer's ketone (PK) in furan gave the trans-fused [4 + 2] cycloadducts 2 and 3, whose structures were determined by their 1H NMR spectra and confirmed by X-ray crystallography. Irradiation of PK in the presence of tetramethylethylene (TME) gave cycloadduct 4 and with 1,1-dimethoxyethylene (DME) gave [2 + 2] cycloadducts 5,6 and 7, respectively. The X-ray crystal structures of 4—7 show that the four- and six-membered rings of 4 and 7 are trans-fused, and 5 and 6 are cis-fused, respectively. Differential quenching of the formation of cycloadducts 2–5 and 7 by the free radical TEMPO was observed. Formation of cycloadducts 2–4 was also quenched differentially by O 2. A short lived (15 nsec) transient observed on nanosecond flash photolysis of PK is suggested to be a highly twisted triplet excited state, which is the likely precursor of both [4 + 2] and [2 + 2] adducts. It is proposed that stepwise addition of furan and alkenes to PK triplets gives triplet biradicals, which can be intercepted by TEMPO and O 2 , and that these reactions probably do not involve a ground state trans-cyclohexenone intermediate.