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Abstract
Asymmetric methodologies are very important as they allow chemists to produce significant quantities of complex chiral molecules as enantiopure or enantioenriched compounds. The Petersen group has previously developed chiral Brønsted acid catalyzed desymmetrization reactions for the asymmetric synthesis of lactones. The work described in this thesis provides an application for this methodology to the synthesis of enantioenriched spirocycles, motifs present in many biologically active molecules. This synthesis is performed in the presence of TRIP, a chiral BINOL-derived phosphoric acid catalyst, which guides the cyclization of symmetric prochiral intermediates. The research in this thesis describes the synthesis of two enantioenriched spirocycles, one of which posed many synthetic challenges. Even though the results were nonconclusive, more synthetic work towards the understanding of the mechanistic pathway is also introduced. Therefore, the work described herein not only contributes to the substrate scope of the reaction that was developed, but also provides discussion to the challenges faced during the synthesis of these compounds.