Recent Advances in Catalytic Asymmetric Ketone Allylations and Their Applications

Due to the wide applications of the resulting chiral tertiary homoallylic alcohols in organic synthesis, catalytic asymmetric ketone allylations have attracted continuous attention from synthetic chemists. Despite the inherent difficulty in enantiofacial differentiation and low reactivity of ketones, the past two decades have witnessed rapid progress in catalytic asymmetric allylation of ketones. Many efficient synthetic methods have been reported, with the discovery of unprecedented chiral catalysts and allylation reagents. The current Review aims to give a summary of the achievements in this area from 2011 to date and is divided into six parts according to the allylation reagents that were applied. Special attention is paid to the scope and application of each method with a brief introduction of corresponding mechanisms.