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Updated: Sep 24, 2025

Enzymatic Cascade Reactions for the Synthesis of Chiral Amino Alcohols from L-lysine
Published on: February 16, 2018
Catalytic Hydrolysis of Thiolates to Alcohols
Tuhin Ganguly1, Abhijit Bera1, Anuj Baran Chakraborty1
1School of Chemical Sciences, Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, 2A & 2B Raja S. C. Mullick Road, Jadavpur, Kolkata-700032, India.
Abstract:
A new and efficient catalytic hydrolysis of aliphatic and aromatic thiolates under ambient conditions is presented. Previously, we have demonstrated (Ganguly et al., Inorg. Chem. 2018, 57, 11306-11309) the Co(II) mediated stoichiometric hydrolysis of thiols to produce alcohols/phenols along with a binuclear dicobalt(II)-hydrosulfide complex, [Co2(PhBIMP)(μ2-SH)(DMF)]2+ (1) (PhBIMP is the anion of 2,6 bis[(bis((N-1-methyl-4,5- diphenylimidazoylmethyl) amino)methyl]- 4-methylphenol). In the present work, we have shown that the product of the stoichiometric reaction, 1, may act as an efficient catalyst for the catalytic hydrolysis of a broad range of aliphatic and aromatic thiolates in DMF at room temperature to produce alcohols/phenols. Complex 1 takes up a thiolate (RS-) and a water molecule to generate an active intermediate complex, [Co2(PhBIMP)(μ2-SH)(RS)(H2O)]1+ (2), which, in turn, releases the alcohol/phenol (ROH), hydrosulfide (HS-), and regenerates 1.
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