Asymmetric Photocatalytic Synthesis of Enantioenriched Azaarene Derivatives

The importance of azaarene derivatives in many arenas, especially pharmaceutical and material industry, has attracted increasing attention of chemists to develop highly efficient synthetic methods. To date, functionalization of commercially available azaarenes and their simple derivatives as feedstocks by exploiting the electronic properties of azaarenes to trigger transformations has been appreciated as a powerful tool. Among them, due to the advantages of mild reaction conditions, good functional group tolerance and diverse reaction types, the methods via visible light-driven photocatalysis have been extensively explored. Notably, a number of asymmetric manifolds towards the synthesis of enantioenriched imine-containing azaarene derivatives have been established with satisfactory results. The advances of this important area are summarized and discussed according to the relative positions of the formed stereocenters to azaarenes.