Chiral silanediols in anion-binding catalysis.

A perfect pair: Silanediols are effective catalysts for the addition of silyl ketene acetals to N-acylisoquinolinium ions. Importantly, this is the first example of a silanediol plausibly participating in anion-binding catalysis, a relatively new direction in the field of hydrogen-bond-donor catalysis. The chiral, enantiopure C2 -symmetric silanediol 1 catalyzes enantioselective transformations.