PPh3-catalyzed synthesis of dicyano-2-methylenebut-3-enoates as efficient dienes in catalytic asymmetric inverse-electron-demand Diels-Alder reaction

We present here the synthesis of dicyano-2-methylenebut-3-enoates as novel Diels-Alder dienes through an efficient PPh3-catalyzed strategy, and an unprecedented PPh3-catalyzed addition/all-carbon-based asymmetric inverse-electron-demand Diels-Alder sequence reaction is disclosed for the first time.