Enantioselective addition of organozinc reagents to carbonyl compounds

Abstract

Different chiral camphorsulfonamide derivatives containing a hydroxy or a sulfonamido functionality, as well as chiral 1,2-hydroxysulfonamides, have been evaluated as chiral promoters in the classical enantioselective addition of dialkylzinc reagents to aldehydes in the presence of titanium tetraisopropoxide (ee up to 96 %). Surprisingly, ligands with a structure of isoborneol are able to promote the related unknown addition to ketones (ee >99 %), the best ligand being the exo-diol derived from 1,2-trans-biscamphorsulfonamidocyclohexane (HOCSAC).