Story perspectives

Breakthrough Method Unlocks Stable Nitrogen Chirality for Drug Development

11/20/2025

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Summary

Story summary

Bin Tan (researcher) and Kendall Houk (researcher) have developed a method to create stable nitrogen stereocentres.
The approach uses substrate engineering and asymmetric chlorination to raise the inversion barrier.
In preliminary results, the researchers generated 1,2-oxaziridine products with >90% enantiomeric excess.
They plan to apply the method to diverse scaffolds and pursue more stable, acyclic nitrogen-stereogenic molecules.
The work could unlock nitrogen chirality's potential in organic synthesis and drug development.

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Story summary

Bin Tan (researcher) and Kendall Houk (researcher) have developed a method to create stable nitrogen stereocentres.
The approach uses substrate engineering and asymmetric chlorination to raise the inversion barrier.
In preliminary results, the researchers generated 1,2-oxaziridine products with >90% enantiomeric excess.
They plan to apply the method to diverse scaffolds and pursue more stable, acyclic nitrogen-stereogenic molecules.
The work could unlock nitrogen chirality's potential in organic synthesis and drug development.