Sidearm Modified Bisoxazoline Ligands and Their Applications

Developing novel and highly efficient chiral ligands is the eternal theme in chiral catalysis research, since none of ligands or catalysts is universal for all the reactions. We are aiming at searching for a facile and effective strategy in developing new chiral ligands that could be employed in a broad range of asymmetric reactions. By introducing additional (sidearm) groups to a classic chiral ligand, both the electron nature and steric environment of the catalyst could be adjusted, and thus the reactivity, selectivity and functional group tolerance of a catalyst could be modulated. Based on this strategy, a variety of sidearm modified bisoxazoline ligands have been designed and developed, including TOX, SaBOX, diSaBOX and Wing-BOX. The account presents a brief introduction on their discovery and representative applications.