New chiral catalysts for phospho-transfer

Chiral salcyan complexes of aluminium are effective air and water tolerant enantioselective catalysts for the hydrophosphonylation of carbonyls. Complexes of the form [(R,R)-salcyan]AlX (X=OH, OR) result in product enantioselectivity changes (Δee) of ca. 100% compared to those returned in the presence of related complexes [(R,R)-salcyen]AlX even though they both possess a chiral ligand framework with the same absolute stereochemistry.