The transition metal-catalyzed asymmetric hydrogenation (AH) of ketones to produce enantioenriched alcohols is an important reaction in organic chemistry with applications in the pharmaceutical and agrochemical fields. Using earth-abundant, biorelevant cobalt as the central metal in the catalyst has a high potential to improve sustainability and achieve hydrogenation reactions that are scalable. However, due to the high d-electron count, designing cobalt catalysts that exhibit turnover numbers (TONs, ≥1000) and enantioselectivities (≥90%) sufficient for synthetic utility and practical scalability (≥1 kg scale) remains a challenge. In this work, an efficient catalyst design strategy utilizing an amino(imino)diphosphine Co(II) bromide precatalyst is presented to achieve this goal. The quantitative production of a wide range of secondary chiral alcohols with TONs of up to 150,000 and an enantiomeric excess (e.e.) of up to 99% at a scale of up to 1.35 kg was achieved, indicating that the proposed cobalt catalyst is highly promising for AH and scale-up reactions. A mechanistic study revealed that the synergism of an N–H functionality and a redox-active ligand endows the cobalt catalyst with a high productivity and excellent enantioselectivity.

中文翻译：

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N-H 官能团和氧化还原活性配体协同作用实现钴催化酮的不对称氢化


过渡金属催化酮的不对称氢化（AH）生产对映体富集的醇是有机化学中的重要反应，在制药和农化领域具有应用。使用地球丰富的、生物相关的钴作为催化剂中的中心金属，具有提高可持续性和实现可扩展的加氢反应的巨大潜力。然而，由于 d 电子数较高，设计具有足以合成实用性和实际可扩展性（≥1 kg 规模）的周转数（TON，≥1000）和对映选择性（≥90%）的钴催化剂仍然是一个挑战。在这项工作中，提出了一种利用氨基（亚氨基）二膦钴（II）溴化物预催化剂的有效催化剂设计策略来实现这一目标。在高达 1.35 kg 的规模下实现了 TON 高达 150,000 且对映体过量 (ee) 高达 99% 的各种仲手性醇的定量生产，表明所提出的钴催化剂在AH 和放大反应。机理研究表明，N-H 官能团和氧化还原活性配体的协同作用赋予钴催化剂高生产率和优异的对映选择性。