The "accurate" synthesis of chiral molecules is of great significance in the fields of life science, material science and pharmaceutical chemistry. The development of novel highly efficient and selective asymmetric catalytic reactions is an important means to promote the accurate synthesis of chiral molecules. Z-olefins are common structural units in organic molecules and widely exist in many natural products and bioactive molecules. Due to the thermodynamic instability of z-olefins relative to e-olefins, the accurate synthesis of chiral compounds containing z-olefin structural units is very challenging.

Taking advantage of the slow mutual conversion rate between π - allyl iridium species with different configurations, you Shuli research team of Shanghai Institute of organic chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, started from z-olefin substrate and generated transient anti - π - allyl iridium intermediate under the action of chiral iridium catalyst. Before the intermediate is transformed into a thermodynamically stable isomer, it is kinetically controlled nucleophilic capture, so as to realize the accurate synthesis of chiral compounds containing z-olefins.

This research work reveals a new asymmetric allyl substitution reaction mode, provides a general synthesis strategy for chiral molecules containing z-olefin structural units, and is expected to be applied to the fields of pharmaceutical chemistry, natural product synthesis and so on. Relevant research results were published in Science in January 2021.