Catalysis marches on

摘要

The production of a wide array of compounds, ranging from polymers to liquid crystals to human therapeutics, depends on stereoselective synthesis, which enables three-dimensional control over the isomer of the product that forms. Not surprisingly, the more stereoselective reactions that chemists have in their toolbox, the more efficiently they can construct these materials. One tool that is not well developed is a method for the stereoselective construction of quaternary stereocentres - in which a carbon atom is bonded to the carbon atoms of four other distinct appendages - at positions that are remote from any other groups in a molecule. In this issue, Sigman and colleagues (page 340) describe a process that accomplishes just that.