Highly stereoselective recognition and deracemization of amino acids by supramolecular self-assembly.

The highly stereoselective supramolecular self-assembly of α-amino acids with a chiral aldehyde derived from binol and a chiral guanidine derived from diphenylethylenediamine (dpen) to form the imino acid salt is reported. This system can be used to cleanly convert D-amino acids into L-amino acids or vice versa at ambient temperature. It can also be used to synthesize α-deuterated D- or L-amino acids. A crystal structure of the ternary complex together with DFT computation provided detailed insight into the origin of the stereoselective recognition of amino acids.