A concise synthesis of highly enantiomerically enriched 2-alkylparaconic acid esters via ruthenium-catalyzed asymmetric hydrogenation of acylsuccinates

Abstract

The catalytic asymmetric hydrogenation of acylsuccinates using RuCl 3 as a precatalyst and atropisomeric diphosphines as chiral auxiliaries allows the synthesis of optically active 2-alkylparaconic acid esters in preparative yields with enantioselectivities up to 99.5% ee.