Chiral 1,4-diphenylphosphines 5-7 as well as thioether 8 were synthesized from tartrates employing Ley's "BDA" and "Dispoke" methodologies as the key step. Rhodium(I) complexes with 5-7 are efficient catalysts for the asymmetric hydrogenation of beta-substituted enamides and MOM-protected beta-hydroxyl enamides, which furnished chiral amines or beta-amino alcohols with 94-->99% ee. These result...

In their attempts to further this advance they were, however, very severely handicapped; from Germany they were entirely cut off, English chemists were otherwise occupied, and, probably the most important factor of all, commercial firms could not be persuaded to introduce new antimony compounds or even to put on the market antimony tartrates of a higher standard of purity than the usual commerc...