Brønsted Acid Catalyzed Enantioselective α-Amidoalkylation in the Synthesis of Isoindoloisoquinolines

This is the authors' abstract. We don't add key points for this paper.

The Parham cyclization-intermolecular α-amidoalkylation sequence results in the facile enantioselective synthesis of 12b-substituted isoindoloisoquinolines (ee up to 95%) using BINOL-derived Brønsted acids. α-Amidoalkylation of indole occurs through the formation of a chiral conjugate base/bicyclic quaternary N-acyliminium ion pair.