Highly Enantioselective Synthesis of Chiral Secondary Amines by Gold(I)/Chiral Brønsted Acid Catalyzed Tandem Intermolecular Hydroamination and Transfer Hydrogenation Reactions

A method for the synthesis of enantiomerically enriched secondary amines with excellent ee values through the tandem intermolecular hydroamination/transfer hydrogenation of alkynes using a "gold(I) complex-chiral Brønsted acid" protocol is developed. The catalysis works for a wide variety of aryl, alkenyl, and aliphatic alkynes as well as anilines with different electronic properties.