Renaissance of pyridine-oxazolines as chiral ligands for asymmetric catalysis

Oxazoline-containing ligands have been widely employed in numerous asymmetric catalytic reactions. Pyridine-oxazoline-type ligands, a class of hybrid ligands, were designed earlier than bisoxazoline and phosphine-oxazoline ligands; however, their unique properties have only been discovered recently. Pyridine-oxazoline-type chiral ligands are rapidly becoming popular for use in asymmetric catalysis, especially for several new and efficient asymmetric methodologies. Several types of challenging asymmetric reactions have been discovered recently using pyridine-oxazoline-type ligands showing their special properties and potential for future application in a wide range of new catalytic methodologies. This review provides an overview of this field, with the aim of highlighting both ligand design and synthetic methodology development.