A novel chiral ferrocenyl phosphine ligand from sugar: applications in Rh-catalyzed asymmetric hydrogenation reactions.

[structure: see text] A new chiral ferrocenyl diphosphine ligand 3 was synthesized from readily available D-mannitol. Rh-complex with this ligand showed high enantioselectivity and reactivity in the asymmetric hydrogenation of dehydroamino acid derivatives and itaconic acid derivatives. Up to over 99% ee and 10 000 TON were achieved with this catalytic system.