The development of a new class of chiral 4-N,N-dialkylaminopyridine acyl-transfer catalysts capable of exploiting both van der Waals (p) and H-bonding interactions to allow remote chiral information to stereochemically control the kinetic resolution of sec-alcohols with moderate to excellent selectivity (s = 6-30). Catalysts derived from (S)-a,a-diarylprolinol are considerably superior to analogues devoid of a tertiary hydroxyl moiety and possess high activity and selectivity across a broad range of substrates.Asymmetric organocatalysis has recently been propelled from relative obscurity to the forefront of contemporary organic chemistry research and is fast-becoming a key strategy in enantioselective synthesis. 1, 2 An important facet of this broad domain is the asymmetric nonenzymatic 3 catalysis of acyl-transfer by chiral organic nucleophiles such as tertiary amines, 4-7 phosphines, 8 N-heterocyclic carbenes 9,10 and secondary alcohols. 11 Although it has been over a century since the discovery of pyridine-promoted alcohol acylation, 12 the design of efficient and selective chiral pyridine-based catalysts for these reactions is a young field less than 10 years old. The desymmetrisation of the 'hypernucleophilic' achiral catalyst 4-N,N-dimethylaminopyridine (DMAP) 13,14 via one of three general strategies, (the introduction of 'planar chirality' either 2,3-pyridofused 15 or installed at the C-3-position of the pyridine ring, 16 the use of axially chiral substituents at C-3 17 or the installation of tetrahedral chirality at either C-4, 18-23 or C-3, 24-27 ) has proven a particularly productive approach which has given rise to a number of highly selective chiral catalysts for the kinetic resolution (KR) of sec-alcohols and other asymmetric acyl-transfer processes. 15,27, 28 The design of such systems is complicated by an activityselectivity conundrum: i.e. to maximise the effectiveness of catalyst stereochemical information it is desirable to install chiral groups as close to the nucleophilic ring nitrogen as possible, however, bulky substituents in the vicinity of the same strongly attenuate catalyst activity. 14,17c,29 A successful (i.e. active and selective) catalyst design must necessarily embody a compromise between these opposing constraints.One appealing solution to this problem (inspired by enzymatic systems) is the design of promoters capable of operating by an 'induced-fit' mechanism, in which the catalyst undergoes a a Centre for Synthesis and Chemical Biology, School of Chemistry, University of Dublin, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland. E-mail: connons@tcd.ie; Fax: +353 1 6712826; Tel: +353 1 6081306 b School of Chemistry, University of Dublin, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland † Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available: General experimental procedures and details, characterisation data for the synthesis of catalysts 14 and 15, 1 H and 13 C NMR spectra for 6 and 7 (and their precursors), X-ray crystal structure data for 6-Bn, atomic coordinates from the DFT calculations and CSP...