Recent development of new designer surfactants further spurs the development of micellar catalysis in water for chemical transformations and catalysis, providing reliable alternatives to the employment of organic solvents.

Replacement of organic solvents, in particular chlorinated, aromatic, and polar aprotic ones, is an emerging issue that can find a solution in the development of catalytic reactions in water. Nature performs a multitude of chemical transformations in water under mild conditions mediated by enzymes. In particular the nanoconfinement effects of the enzymes ensure high activity and impressive stereoselectivities. Micellar catalysis is nowadays a real alternative approach to catalysis in traditional organic media, enabling good activity under mild conditions, with the advantage of possible catalyst and micellar medium recycling. Micellar media emerged also as good nano‐environments for stereoselective reactions, with many examples of chemical transformations mediated by metal and organo‐catalysts for which improvements of stereoselectivity were observed with respect to the same reaction under homogeneous conditions in traditional organic solvents. More specifically, both the catalytically active site and the micelles provided by the surfactant can contribute to the asymmetric induction, partially resembling what known in terms of stereoselectivity imparted by the active site of enzymes and metallo‐enzymes.

The hexameric resorcin[4]arene capsule as a self-assembled organocatalyst promotes a series of reactions like the carbonyl–ene cyclization of (S)-citronellal preferentially to isopulegol, the water elimination from 1,1-diphenylethanol, the isomerization of α-pinene and β-pinene preferentially to limonene and minor amounts of camphene. The role of the supramolecular catalyst consists in promoting the protonation of the substrates leading to the formation of cationic intermediates that are stabilized within the cavity with consequent peculiar features in terms of acceleration and product selectivity. In all cases the catalytic activity displayed by the hexameric capsule is remarkable if compared to many other strong Brønsted or Lewis acids.

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