Asymmetric reduction of chlorinated 4-oxopentanoates with Bakers' yeast. Synthesis of optically active. gamma.-butyrolactones and useful chiral building blocks

S Tsuboi, J Sakamoto, T Kawano…

Index: Tsuboi, Sadao; Sakamoto, Jun-ichi; Kawano, Takayuki; Utaka, Masanori; Takeda, Akira Journal of Organic Chemistry, 1991 , vol. 56, # 25 p. 7177 - 7179

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Citation Number: 22

Abstract

The asymmetric reduction of carbonyl groups by bakers' yeast (Saccharomyces) is a well- known reaction that is widely applied for the preparation of chiral building blocks.'It has been published by many groups that a-halo ketones are easily reduced with bakers' yeast to give chiral halo hydrins. 2 Most of these studies are concerned with the reductions of 8-keto esters. Recently we reported the syntheses of chiral epoxides, key intermediates of natural ...