Nitrogen-15 isotope can trigger asymmetric autocatalytic reactions toward chiral organic compounds
Wednesday, October 19, 2016 - 07:01
in Physics & Chemistry
The preparation of chiral compounds as intermediates in drug synthesis is one of the most important targets in synthetic organic chemistry. Japanese scientists have now shown that the autocatalytic preparation of a chiral intermediate can be triggered by a compound bearing hidden chirality, which consisted of nothing more than the difference between the isotopes nitrogen-15 and nitrogen-14. The study is published in the journal Angewandte Chemie.