An overview of chiral molybdenum complexes applied in enantioselective catalysis

Abstract

The aim of this contribution is to highlight the attractive applications of molybdenum in asymmetric catalysis. Even if molybdenum plays several biological roles mainly in metalloproteins, it has been less employed in catalysis in comparison with other transition metals. This perspective focuses on molybdenum complexes linked to chiral ligands applied in enantioselective processes. The versatility of molybdenum in terms of oxidation states and coordination geometries triggers its capability to catalyse different kind of processes such as carbon–carbon bond formation, olefin metathesis or alkene epoxidation among the most relevant transformations.