Organocatalysts are becoming an increasingly popular alternative to traditional metal-based catalysts due to cost, availability, environmental friendliness and typical requirement of mild reaction conditions. In particular, chiral phosphoric acids have gained rapid interest in recent years as highly enantioselective catalysts for a variety of reactions. Catalytic transformations such as Fischer indolizations, epoxide ring openings and dihydroquinazolinone syntheses are probed by density functional theory (DFT) calculations using dispersion-corrected density functionals such as wB97X-D and B97-D. Enantioselectivity is predominantly driven by noncovalent interactions such as dispersion and electrostatic interactions between the substrate and catalyst within the chiral confined pocket of the catalyst. Catalyst performance due to adjustment of the aryl substituents and/or chiral diol backbones is also examined.

Role of noncovalent interactions in asymmetric catalysis involving chiral phosphoric acids

251st National Meeting (2016)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.