Carbohydrate-based organocatalysts in direct asymmetric aqueous aldol reaction

Aldol reaction involving chiral amines as organocatalysts through enamine formation, like class-I aldolases, is one of the thriving areas of general interest and widely applicable asymmetric reactions. There are many natural and synthetic chiral templates known to work as efficient organocatalysts, but using carbohydrate templates for chiral induction in asymmetric aldol reactions is a relatively new area developed in the recent years. This review focuses on carbohydrates alone or their conjugates with previously known chiral moieties as organocatalysts for asymmetric aldol reactions.     

Modulating the acidity: highly acidic Brønsted acids in asymmetric catalysis

Recently, chiral highly acidic Brønsted acids have emerged as powerful catalysts for enantioselective C C and C X bond‐forming reactions. Their strong acidity renders them valuable tools for the activation of imines, carbonyl compounds, and other weakly basic substrates. As a result, new perspectives are opened and highly stereoselective transformations based on the concept of chiral contact‐ion‐pair catalysis can be realized. This Minireview gives an overview of the design and application of these new organocatalysts and presents recent results in this rapidly growing field.     

有机小分子催化的不对称Strecker反应研究进展

有机小分子催化的不对称合成反应是目前研究最为活跃的领域之一. 不对称Strecker反应是合成光学活性α-氨基酸衍生物的有效手段. 目前报道的催化不对称Strecker反应的有机催化剂主要有手性胍类、手性(硫)脲衍生物、氮-氧偶极化合物、手性Brønsted酸等, 取得了良好的催化活性和对映选择性. 对各类有机小分子催化剂在有机催化不对称Strecker反应中的应用研究进展, 以及催化剂结构与反应条件对催化活性和不对称诱导作用的影响进行了简要评述.     

Enantioconvergent Substitution Reactions of Racemic Electrophiles by Organocatalysis

Over the past decades, the development of enantioselective catalysis using organocatalysts has evolved into an active research field and a number of enantioselective transformations have been established. However, despite their being a highly desirable process for the synthesis of organic molecules in an enantioenriched form, the enantioconvergent substitution reactions of racemic electrophiles using organocatalysts still present several challenges. Although intrinsic difficulties in the catalytic stereocontrol abound due to the initial chiral information of racemic electrophiles, in recent years, mechanistically diverse enantioconvergent processes have been intensively investigated in organocatalysis. This Minireview focuses on recent achievements in the development of enantioconvergent substitution reactions of racemic electrophiles using organocatalysts. The contents are classified on the basis of the mechanistic types of enantioconvergent processes.     

Design,synthesis, and application of chiral electron-poor guanidines as hydrogen-bonding catalysts for the Michael reaction

The first chiral electron-poor guanidine organocatalysts were synthesized. The presence of a tunable electron-withdrawing group on the guanidine moiety allows for the modulation of the catalysts’ activity. The application of this new class of organocatalysts to the Michael reaction is demonstrated.     

Functionalized Chiral Ionic Liquids: A New Type of Asymmetric Organocatalysts and Nonclassical Chiral Ligands

By judiciously anchoring functional groups onto chiral ionic liquids, functionalized chiral ionic liquids (FCILs) are emerging as a new type of asymmetric organocatalysts and nonclassical chiral ligands. This Focus Review highlights the applications of FCILs from the viewpoint of asymmetric catalysis. We focus mainly on the de novo designed and synthesized FCILs which likely still maintain the typical ionic liquids properties, and in a few cases relevant ionic liquid immobilized chiral catalysts are briefly discussed.     

有机小分子催化不对称Henry反应的研究进展

综述了各类有机小分子催化剂(如金鸡纳碱衍生物、手性(硫)脲、手性二级胺、金鸡纳碱-硫脲衍生物、胍-硫脲衍生物等)在不对称Henry反应中的研究进展。参考文献18篇。     

Chiral quaternary phosphonium salts: a new class of organocatalysts

Phase-transfer catalysis has widely been used as a prime synthetic tool for both laboratory and industrial processes. During the last twenty years, asymmetric phase-transfer catalysis using chiral organocatalysts has attracted widespread interest. However, the scope of chiral phase-transfer catalysis has been limited mostly to the quaternary ammonium salts. As an emerging area, the recent developments in the application of quaternary phosphonium salts as chiral phase-transfer catalysts are discussed in this article.     

Organocatalyzed Enantioselective Desymmetrization of Diols in the Preparation of Chiral Building Blocks

Desymmetrization of diols is a powerful tool to the synthesis of chiral building blocks. Among the different approaches to perform discrimination between both enantiotopic hydroxyl groups, the organocatalytic approach has gained importance in the last years. A diverse range of organocatalysts has been used to efficiently promote this enantioselective transformation and this Minireview examines the different contributions in this field.     

Chiral anion-mediated asymmetric ring opening of meso-aziridinium and episulfonium ions

Reactions proceeding through cationic intermediates that lack a Lewis or Br?nsted basic site present a challenge for traditional asymmetric catalysis based on chiral metals or organocatalysts. We present an enantioselective ring opening of tetrasubstituted meso-aziridinium ions with alcohol nucleophiles proceeding through a chiral ion pair with a binaphthol-phosphate anion. The reaction is initiated by silver-induced ring closure of beta-chloroamines using the Ag salt of the chiral anion as in situ generated catalyst. Use of insoluble Ag2CO3 as silver source is essential to obtain high enantioselectivity; we believe the chiral phosphate acts as a "chiral anion phase transfer catalyst" to bring silver ion into the organic phase. The chiral anion concept can also be extended to the related asymmetric opening of meso-episulfonium ions generated by protonation of trichloroacetimidates vicinal to sulfides.     

Design of chiral organocatalysts for practical asymmetric synthesis of amino acid derivatives

A series of structurally rigid, chiral quaternary ammonium salts and several chiral sec-amine catalysts derived from commercially available (R)- or (S)-binaphthol have been designed as new C(2)-symmetric chiral phase-transfer catalysts and chiral bifunctional amino-catalysts. These chiral organocatalysts have been successfully applied to the highly practical asymmetric synthesis of various amino acid derivatives.     

Ionic liquids as a medium for enantioselective catalysis

Over the last years, interest involving ionic liquids (ILs) used as reaction medium for homogeneous enantioselective catalysis has exponentially expanded. In many cases, the use of ILs provides several advantages over reactions in organic solvents in terms of activity and enantioselectivity. Even more important, the catalyst immobilization in IL can avoid its leaching and consequently favour its recycling. This review deals with recent advances in the investigation of these new solvents in asymmetric catalysis. We go over enzymes, chiral organocatalysts and metal complexes containing chiral ligands used in enantioselective processes using ionic liquids, with special emphasis on the catalyst reuse and also the separation of organic products.     

Design of chiral bifunctional secondary amine catalysts for asymmetric enamine catalysis

A series of binaphthyl-based secondary amine catalysts containing various functional groups have been designed as new chiral bifunctional amine catalysts. These chiral organocatalysts have been successfully applied to several asymmetric reactions via enamine intermediates and exhibit unique reactivity and selectivity in comparison with proline and its derivatives.     

Application of sulfonyl chlorides and chiral amines in the efficient synthesis of nonracemic sulfinamides

A simple protocol that allows the preparation of separable epimeric sulfinamides from chiral amines and sulfonyl chlorides reduced in situ with triphenylphosphine in the presence of KOH is described. Using this method, tosyl chloride and nosyl chloride were successfully reacted with α-substituted primary amines to give five diastereomeric pairs, in certain cases accompanied by a small amount of the corresponding sulfonamide. Enantiopure products were isolated by column chromatography. The obtained enantiomerically pure sulfinamides were tested as organocatalysts in the asymmetric epoxide ring opening.     

Advances on asymmetric organocatalytic 1,4-conjugate addition reactions in aqueous and semi-aqueous media

Asymmetric Michael addition reactions or 1,4-conjugate addition reactions are considered to be the fundamental C–C bond-forming reaction for the construction of chiral β-nitro, β-carbonyl and several other important structural motifs in organic synthesis. After the development of many chiral metal complexes as catalysts, a tremendous growth in the design and applications of variety of new chiral organocatalysts for asymmetric 1,4-conjugate addition reactions has been witnessed over the last two decades. Initially, asymmetric organocatalysis has been performed in organic solvents, but gradually performing the same catalysis in aqueous and semi-aqueous media became a necessity due to environmental aspects as well as to achieve better reactivity and selectivity. The structural and functional diversity of the chiral organocatalysts derived from natural and synthetic sources utilized differently the water either as the sole solvent, co-solvent or additive for optimising their best performances. In the present review, we discuss a detailed and comprehensive report on the advancement in the field of asymmetric organocatalytic 1,4-conjugate addition reactions in aqueous and semi-aqueous media.     

Synthesis of chiral organocatalysts derived from aziridines: application in asymmetric aldol reaction

We report the synthesis of a new series of highly efficient chiral organocatalysts derived via the regio- and stereoselective ring opening of chiral aziridines with azide anions. The catalysts have proved to be very efficient for a direct asymmetric aldol reaction, both with cyclic as well as acyclic ketones in brine with 2 mol % of catalyst loading, and afforded the products in excellent yields (up to 99%) and enantioselectivities (up to >99%). The chiral aldol adduct obtained has further been converted to a chiral azetidine ring via a convenient pathway.     

The state of the art in asymmetric induction: the aldol reaction as a case study

This review highlights the achievements in asymmetric induction in the context of the aldol reaction during the years 2003–2007. While chiral auxiliary-mediated methods are the best understood and developed, catalytic methods based on chiral metal–ligand complexes and more recently organocatalysts promise to improve the efficacy and economics of asymmetric induction. This review provides a brief summary of work prior to 2003 on chiral auxiliaries, metal catalysts and organocatalysts, and then delineates the state of the art in each process. It appears that no one method of achieving asymmetric induction in the aldol reaction is universally superior.     

Asymmetric induction in the preparation of helical receptor-anion complexes: ion-pair formation with chiral cations

Asymmetry through ion pairing: Upon addition of chloride and bromide ions, as chiral ammonium salts, to solutions of pyrrole-based π-conjugated linear oligomers, helical structures form with asymmetric induction, which is guided by the formation of diastereomeric ion pairs with chiral counter cations. These ions pairs exhibit circular dichroism (CD) and strong circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) with g(lum) values of greater than 0.1.     

Recent applications of mechanochemistry in enantioselective synthesis

In recent years, sustainable organocatalysis has become a relevant target in asymmetric organic synthesis. Among the most successful strategies to achieve “greener” organocatalyzed processes are (1) the elimination of solvent from reaction media, and (2) the use of alternative activation energies such as solvent-free mechanochemistry in high speed ball mills. In recent years we have stepped up efforts in the pursuit of organocatalysts and biocatalysts that allow reactions to take place in the absence of solvent and under mechanochemical activation. In this article we present the application of small dipeptides as chiral organocatalysts under solvent-free and high-speed ball milling conditions, with focus on the asymmetric aldol addition reaction. Finally, we report on recent results using supported enzymes for the resolution of racemic β-amino acids and amines, under mechanochemical conditions.     

The ying and yang of asymmetric aminocatalysis

During the last six years the asymmetric catalysis of carbonyl transformations via iminium ion and enamine intermediates using chiral amines as organocatalysts has grown most remarkably. In this personal account an overview of this area is given. The field can be divided into two sub areas: (a) Iminium catalysis, which is typically used for cycloadditions and conjugate additions to enals and enones and (b) Enamine catalysis, which is commonly used in electrophilic alpha-substitution reactions of ketones and aldehydes. A common origin of the two catalysis principles is proposed and their recent merger in tandem sequences is discussed.