Commonly available hydrolases have proven to be capable of recognizing and stereoselectively binding remote heteroatom stereogenic centres[1]. In the course of our investigations we applied the enzymatic methodology in the preparation of chiral sulfur and phosphorus compounds, using both kinetic resolution of racemic mixtures and desymmetrisation of prochiral substrates. In this way, using esterases, lipases, proteases and nitrilases a variety of optically active heteroorganic derivatives were obtained, such as sulfoxides, phosphine oxides, hydroxymethylphosphinates and their P-borane derivatives. Enzymatic desymmetrisation of bis-hydroxymethyl sulfoxide and phosphine oxides was used as a route to chiral tridentate catalysts. The results will be presented and discussed.
Reference :
[1] P. Kiełbasiński, M. Mikołajczyk. Chiral heteroatom-containing compounds. In : Future Directions in Biocatalysis, T. Matsuda (Ed.), Elsevier, Amsterdam, 2007, pp. 159–203.