(S)-(+)-4-Nitro-2-butanol (1) obtained by the stereoselective reduction of 4-nitro-2-butanone by bakers’ yeast was employed for the syntheses of natural products. A precursor of (+)-brefeldin A is synthesized starting from this chiral building block by 10 steps short-cut procedure compared with the shortest method so far reported. (S)-(+)-Sulcatol is obtained in much better enantiomeric purity than those reported. The reactivity of 1 in base-catalyzed condensations with Michael acceptors or aldehydes is largely affected by a base employed as the catalyst.
Secondary phosphine oxides O=PHR2 (SPOs) were identified as multitalented preligands for the chemoselective Pd‐catalyzedoxidation of alcohols by a hydrogen‐abstracting methodology. SPOs were found to promote the hydrogen‐abstraction step as well as hydrogen transfer to a Michael acceptor by generating a putative active H−Pd species. The catalytic system operates under neutral conditions and was proven