Applications of Helical-Chiral Pyridines as Organocatalysts in Asymmetric Synthesis

A new family of chiral pyridines has been designed and synthesized for use in asymmetric organocatalysis. Thus, helical-chiral pyridines induce high enantioselectivity in a range of mechanistically unrelated, synthetically significant transformations, including Friedel-Crafts alkylation with nitroalkenes, periselective Diels-Alder reactions with nitroalkenes, the ring-opening of epoxides with a chloride nucleophile, and the propargylation of aldehydes. DOI 10.1002/tcr.201200010