Highly Active Polymer‐Supported (Salen)Al Catalysts for the Enantioselective Addition of Cyanide to α,β‐Unsaturated Imides

In this contribution, we describe polymer‐supported ( R,R )‐(salen)AlCl complexes that were immobilized on poly(norbornene)s and display excellent activities and enantioselectivies as catalysts for the 1,4‐conjugate addition of cyanide to α,β‐unsaturated imides. These supported catalysts could be recycled up to 5 times without compromising catalyst activities or selectivities. Furthermore, the catalyst loadings could be reduced from 10–15 mol%, the common catalyst loadings for non‐supported (salen)Al catalysts, to 5 mol%, a decrease of metal content by 50–66%, without lowering product yields or enantioselectivities. Kinetic studies indicated that the polymer‐supported catalysts are significantly more active than their corresponding unsupported analogues, which makes this catalyst system key to a successful implementation of this catalytic transformation into the fine chemical and pharmaceutical industries.