The chiral oxazoline motif is present
in many ligands that have
been extensively applied in a series of important metal-catalyzed
enantioselective reactions. This Review aims to provide a comprehensive
overview of the most significant applications of oxazoline-containing
ligands reported in the literature starting from 2009 until the end
of 2018. The ligands are classified not by the reaction to which their
metal complexes have been applied but by the nature of the denticity,
chirality, and donor atoms involved. As a result, the continued development
of ligand architectural design from mono(oxazolines), to bis(oxazolines),
to tris(oxazolines) and tetra(oxazolines) and variations thereof can
be more easily monitored by the reader. In addition, the key transition
states of selected asymmetric transformations will be given to illustrate
the features that give rise to high levels of asymmetric induction.
As a further aid to the reader, we summarize the majority of schemes
with representative examples that highlight the variation in % yields
and %
ee
s for carefully selected substrates. This
Review should be of particular interest to the experts in the field
but also serve as a useful starting point to new researchers in this
area. It is hoped that this Review will stimulate both the development/design
of new ligands and their applications in novel metal-catalyzed asymmetric
transformations.