Novel Tridentate Aminophenol Ligand for Alkylzinc Additions

Significance

The authors have developed a new tridentate aminophenol ligand for use in enantio­selective addition of diethylzinc to both aromatic and aliphatic aldehydes in consistently high yields and enantioselectivities. Conveniently, this ligand can be synthesized from readily available starting material in only three steps. Unfortunately, diphenylzinc and phenylacetylene addition reactions to aldehydes using this tridentate ligand provide only low levels of asymmetric induction.