Chiral Brønsted base-promoted nitroalkane alkylation: enantioselective synthesis of sec-alkyl-3-substituted indoles.

A Brønsted base-catalyzed reaction of nitroalkanes with alkyl electrophiles provides indole heterocycles substituted at C3 bearing a sec-alkyl group with good enantioselectivity (up to 90% ee). Denitration by hydrogenolysis provides a product with equally high ee. An indolenine intermediate is implicated in the addition step, and surprisingly, water cosolvent was found to have a beneficial effect in this step, leading to a one-pot protocol for elimination/enantioselective addition using PBAM, a bis(amidine) chiral nonracemic base.