Static to inducibly dynamic stereocontrol: The convergent use of racemic β-substituted ketones

Expanding the kinetic resolution purview Dynamic kinetic resolution (DKR) is a powerful method to transform a pair of mirror-image reactants into just one of the two possible mirror-image products. The key is to find a means of rapidly interconverting the reactants while one of them is being more efficiently funneled to product. DeHovitz et al. report cooperative application of organocatalysis, photoredox catalysis, and enzymatic catalysis to achieve DKR of β-substituted ketones into chiral alcohols. This β position has typically been considered too configurationally stable for a DKR approach. Science , this issue p. 1113