A mild method for Friedel-Crafts acylation with aromatic and aliphatic carboxylic acids using cyanuric chloride, pyridine, and AlCl(3) was developed. Both inter- and intramolecular acylations were achieved at room temperature in high yield and in very short reaction times.

The direct functionalization of aromatic compounds, via Friedel-Crafts alkylation reactions with alcohols, is one of the cornerstones in organic chemistry. The present emerging area deals with the recent advances in the use of pi-activated alcohols in the catalytic and stereoselective construction of benzylic stereocenters.

Artificial metalloenzymes have emerged as an attractive new approach to enantioselective catalysis. Herein, we introduce a novel strategy for preparation of artificial metalloenzymes utilizing amber stop codon suppression methodology for the in vivo incorporation of metal-binding unnatural amino acids. The resulting artificial metalloenzymes were applied in catalytic asymmetric Friedel-Crafts a...

A novel acetyl chloride-mediated cascade transformation involving three components (benzyl carbamate, ethyl glyoxylate and arene nucleophiles) is reported. Aryl orthogonally protected α-amino acids are obtained in a one pot cascade, using a mild AcOH-AcCl system, via a critical autocatalytic dehydration-activation step ensuring an original and efficient Friedel-Crafts orchestration.

DNA-based catalysis can be used to control the enantioselectivity of copper-catalysed Diels-Alder and Friedel-Crafts reactions to produce either enantiomer of the product by changing the denticity of the ligand coordinated to the Cu(II) ion, even though the DNA adopts a right handed helical conformation only.

We developed a novel method of synthesizing nitrogen-containing fused-polycyclic compounds using tyramine derivatives as substrates. The method is based on the dearomatization of phenols via an intramolecular ipso-Friedel-Crafts allenylation and sequential bond-forming-cleavage reactions initiated by the construction of an indole skeleton. Structurally diverse fused-heterocycles were produced i...