Determination of the Enantiomeric Composition of Chiral Amines Based on the Quenching of the Fluorescence of a Chiral Calixarene

The synthesis of three chiral calixarene derivatives is described. One of these, an (S)-di-2-naphthylprolinol tetramer, is shown to exhibit significant ability to discriminate between enantiomers of 1-phenylethylamine (PEA) and norephedrine on the basis of the quenching of the (S)-di-2-naphthylprolinol fluorescence emission in chloroform. The chiral discrimination appears to arise from preorganization of the four (S)-di-2-naphthylprolinol substituents on the calixarene, which define a three-dimensional chiral space. The ability to measure the enantiomeric composition of PEA and norephedrine to within an error of 4.1% and 2.6%, respectively, on the basis of a single fluorescence measurement is demonstrated.