Principles for Designing an Achiral Receptor Promoting Asymmetric Autocatalysis with Amplification of Chirality

The idea that an achiral receptor can promote asymmetric autocatalysis with amplification of chirality is presented and discussed in the light of two models, dubbed ACM1 and ACM2, corresponding to the autocatalytic versions of the classical Kagan and Noyori models for non-linear effects in asymmetric catalysis. The chiral amplifications produced by the two models have been investigated. The results suggest that an achiral receptor working according to the ACM1 model presents distinct advantages over the ACM2 counterpart, both in terms of elegance of design and performance.