Guan-Leong Chua

Discovery of indium complexes as water-tolerant Lewis acids

The work on development of organic reactions that are tolerant to air and moisture, especially that of carbon-carbon bond forming reactions, had only started in the early 1990s. Our laboratory had approached this subject when it was still in its infancy and had developed methodologies for that end. In this article, our decade of work on indium complexes as Lewis acids is summarised.

Highly stereoselective indium trichloride-catalysed asymmetric aldol reaction of formaldehyde and a glucose-derived silyl enol ether in water

The yield and stereochemical outcome of the reaction between D-glucose-derived silyl enol ether 1 (Z and E isomers) and commercial formaldehyde in water catalysed by indium(III) choride was studied.