ABSTRACT Chirality is an interesting property in molecules with a plethora of potential applications. In this line, due to their origin, most chiral natural compounds can be considered enantiopure, and many of these molecules include interesting functional groups that can be of interest in both coordination and organometallic chemistry to obtain chiral coordinated and/or organometallic compounds. And most importantly, these molecules may thus confer chiral properties into their metal complexes. Therefore, in this work, we show the use of kaurenoic ( 1 ) and beyerenoic ( 2 ) acids as efficient ligands to obtain the corresponding organometallic Ru(II) complexes by using ( η 6 ‐ p ‐cymene)Ru( μ ‐Cl)Cl 2 as starting material by a simple procedure reacting the corresponding sodium salts of 1 and 2 ( 1a and 2a ) with ( η 6 ‐ p ‐cymene)Ru( μ ‐Cl)Cl 2 in an 2:1 M ratio to yield the corresponding ( S a)‐Ru( η 6 ‐ p ‐cymene)( κ 2 ‐beyerenate)Cl ( 3 ) and ( S a)‐Ru( η 6 ‐ p ‐cymene)( κ 2 ‐kaurenate)Cl ( 4 ) derivatives. Both complexes were fully characterized by common spectroscopic techniques and their structures unequivocally determined by single crystal X‐ray diffraction analysis. In addition, the chirality of both organometallic compounds was analyzed by electronic circular dichroism techniques as well as by in silico methods. Antimicrobial assays were boarded demonstrating slight antifungal activity. The results not only confirm the conferring of chirality by the ligands to their organometallic derivatives but also open a window for their future potential applications as, for example, potential chiral catalysts or as metallodrugs in the battle against diseases of global concern as well optimistically inspiring the potential use of other natural products as ligands with a wide number of applications.
Martínez‐Torres et al. (Mon,) studied this question.