A new class of chiral primary amine catalysts bearing multiple hydrogen-bonding donors have been designed and synthesized. The newly developed bifunctional organocatalysts efficiently catalyzed not only enantioselective conjugate addition of aromatic ketones to nitroolefins in good yields (up to 87%) with excellent enantioselectivities (97→99% ee) but also enantioselective conjugate addition of acetone to nitroolefins in excellent yields (90-96%) with high enantioselectivities (up to 97% ee).
© 2012 American Chemical Society