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The first enantioselective organocatalytic reductive amination reaction has been accomplished. The development of a new chiral phosphoric acid catalyst has provided a convenient strategy for the enantioselective construction of protected primary amines and provided a highly stereoselective method for the reductive amination of heterocyclic amines. A diverse spectrum of ketone and amine substrates can be accommodated in high yield and excellent enantioselectivity. This new protocol realizes a key benefit of reductive amination versus imine reduction, in that ketimines derived from alkyl-alkyl ketones are unstable to isolation, a fundamental limitation that is comprehensively bypassed using this direct organocatalytic reductive amination.
Storer et al. (Wed,) studied this question.