Chiral porous coordination networks: rational design and applications in enantioselective processes

This paper provides a short review of recent progress in the synthesis and characterization of homochiral metal-organic coordination networks (MOCNs) and their applications in the areas of asymmetric catalysis and chiral separations. Although chiral MOCNs can be constructed from achiral components, the resulting bulk solids tend to be racemic and are thus not useful for enantioselective processes. A couple of examples of homochiral solids built from achiral bridging ligands are presented along with more prevalent homochiral MOCNs built from chiral bridging ligands that are categorized based on their network dimensionality. Preliminary applications of these homochiral solids in asymmetric catalysis and chiral separations are also presented. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.