Asymmetric reduction of carbon–nitrogen, carbon–oxygen, and carbon–carbon double bonds by homogeneous catalytic hydrogenation

Abstract

Asymmetric homogeneous hydrogenations of carbon-nitrogen, carbon-oxygen, and carbon-carbon double bonds have been achieved with the same Rh^I-chiral diphosphine [(–)-diop] catalyst; all the products have the R configuration and a small increase in optical yields is obtained by changing the solvent from methanol to propan-2-ol.