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Fluorine-containing compounds are useful in many applications ranging from pharmaceuticals to ferroelectric crystals. We have developed a new, highly enantioselective synthetic route to trifluoromethyl-bearing stereocenters in up to 96% ee via asymmetric hydrogenation using N,P-ligated iridium catalysts. We also hydrogenated an isomeric mixture of olefins; this reaction gave the hydrogenation product highly enantioselectively (87% ee), and only the E isomer was present after the reaction had reached 56% conversion.

New chiral bidentate imidazole-phosphine ligands have been prepared and evaluated for the iridium-catalysed asymmetric hydrogenation of olefins. The imidazole-phosphine-ligated iridium catalysts hydrogenated trisubstituted olefins with the same sense of enantiodiscrimination as known iridium catalysts possessing oxazole and thiazole as N-donors. The imidazole-based catalysts were shown to hydrogenate vinyl fluorides, in some cases with the highest ee values published to date.

The asymmetric Heck reaction using P,N-ligands has been studied by a combination of theoretical and experimental methods. The reaction follows Halpern-style selectivity, that is, the major isomer is produced from the least favored form of the pre-insertion intermediate. The initially formed Ph-Pd(P,N) species prefers a geometry with the phenyl trans to N. However, the alternative form, with Ph trans to P, is much less stable but much more reactive. In the preferred transition state, the phenyl moiety is trans to P, but significant electron density has been transferred to the alkene carbon trans to N. The steric interactions in this transition state fully account for the enantioselectivity observed with the ligands studied. The calculations also predict relative reactivity and nonlinear mixing effects for the investigated ligands, these predictions are fully validated by experimental testing. Finally, the low conversion observed with some catalysts was found to be caused by inactivation due to weak binding of the ligand to Pd(0). Adding monodentate PPh3 alleviated the precipitation problem without deteriorating the enantioselectivity and led to one of the most effective catalytic systems to date.

A series of new phosphine-thiazole compounds has been synthesized and used as efficient ligands in the palladium-catalyzed asymmetric intermolecular Heck coupling of 2,3-dihydrofuran with aryl triflates and cyclohexenyl triflate. Microwave heating was used to accelerate the reactions and gave complete conversions in as little as one hour. Products were obtained with good to excellent enantioselectivities.