Organocatalytic Domino Reactions

Since the rediscovery of proline in 2000 as catalyst in aldol reaction by List, Barbas and Lerner and, soon after, the development of iminium catalysis by D. W. C. MacMillan, the emergence of organocatalysis as an important tool in organic synthesis is outstanding. During the last years, several research groups have worked in the development of new and powerful methodologies that allow us to build difficult molecules with high yields and enantioselectivities in a metal-free environment. Moreover, the possibility to join two or more organocatalytic reactions in one process has become one challenging goal for chemists, probably due to the costly protecting groups and time-consuming purification procedures after each synthetic step that are one of the common issues in organic synthesis. To circumvent these problems, tandem, domino, cascade or multicomponent organocatalytic reactions have been utilized for the efficient diastereo- and enantioselective construction of complex molecules from simple precursors in simple processes. For example, different tandem organocatalytic reactions such as cyclopropanation, aziridination, Michael-aldol, Michael-alkylation, etc. have been developed since 2006 with excellent yields and stereoselectivities. Herein, we describe the last trends and examples of organocatalytic domino reactions. This review aims to cover and discuss the current development of this fast growing field.