Recent Advances in the Enantioselective Synthesis of b-Amino Acids

The introductory section of this review presents some of the currently most compelling b-amino acid targets, according to their structural types: a- and b-aryl substituted, olefinic and alkynyl, a,a- and a,b-disubstituted, cyclic and conformationally restricted, fluorine-containing, and phosphonic analogous b-amino acids. The main section highlights some of the very new (1996-1998), promising methodology for the enantioselective synthesis of b-amino acids, with especial emphasis on catalytic and enzymatic processes, as well as methods based on chiral pool, self-regeneration of stereogenic centers, diastereoselective nucleophilic additions to prochiral double bonds, and enantioselective reactions in the presence of chiral additives.