A Journey Across Recent Advances in Catalytic and Stereoselective Alkylation of Indoles

In this Account our recent results in relation to the catalytic and stereoselective Friedel-Crafts (FC) alkylation of indoles are described. Over the last decade, remarkable efforts have been devoted towards the replacement of the primal approaches with new more efficient, reliable, and environmentally benign strategies for the functionalization of indoles. Moreover, the emerging area of catalytic asymmetric FC processes is addressed and some examples of enantioselective alkylations of indoles via 1,4-addition to (alpha),(beta)-unsaturated systems and asymmetric ring-opening reaction of aromatic epoxides are described.