The copper-catalyzed asymmetric allylic substitution

This mini-review discusses the rapidly growing field of asymmetric copper-catalyzed chemistry. Although the allylic substitution has been less studied than the conjugate addition, recent breakthroughs have made this methodology a very valuable synthetic tool. Thus, a primary allylic halide or phosphate reacts with Grignard or diorganozinc reagents to afford the S-N' product (or gamma-product) in high regio- and enantioselectivities. Besides the results of the authors, we present also other, different approaches to this reaction, with emphasis on the organometallic and the type of chiral ligand used.