Chiral oxazolidinones via biocatalytic aziridination of unactivated alkenes

Chiral oxazolidinones are privileged heterocycles broadly used in asymmetric synthesis (1) and drug discovery (2–3). Conventional synthetic routes rely on a “chiral pool” strategy, where enantiopure amino alcohols are required as key intermediates. Of particular importance are a class of 5-(S)-aminomethyl oxazolidinones that are key scaffolds in next-generation antibiotics targeting multidrug- and extensively drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis (4–6). While many strategies exist to construct chirality at the 4-position (α-to-nitrogen), methods to install the desired 5-stereocentre (α-to-oxygen) remain underdeveloped. Here we report a haemprotein-catalysed aziridination/ring-expansion cascade that enables direct, enantioselective synthesis of clinically relevant and discovery-stage oxazolidinones from simple alkenes. This work advances haemprotein-catalysed nitrene transfer by enabling functionalisation of unactivated alkenes, a reactivity previously limited to conjugated systems such as styrenes. Computational analysis further reveals that key mutations introduced through directed evolution are responsible for the enantioselective formation of these products.

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Author notes
  1. These authors contributed equally: Yu Zhang, Pei-Pei Xie, Sophia J. Wu

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Zi-Qi Li, Deirdre Hanley, Sophia J. Wu, Zi-Yang Qin, Chi Zhang, Edwin Alfonzo, Francesca-Zhoufan Li, Sabine Brinkman-Chen & Frances H. Arnold

  2. Department of Chemistry, University of Pittsburgh, 219 Parkman Avenue, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

    Yu Zhang, Pei-Pei Xie & Peng Liu

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Peng Liu or Frances H. Arnold.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information (download DOCX )

Materials and Methods, containing the following sections: 1. General information; 2. Preparation of substrates; 3. Preparation of product standards; 4. Summary of classic synthetic approaches for oxazolidinone antibiotics; 5. Reaction discovery; 6. Kinetic experiments; 7. DNA sequences and protein sequences; 8. Analytical-scale enzymatic reactions and calibration curves for products; 9. Preparative-scale reaction set-up and product quantification; 10. Computational details; 11. Representative analytical data; 12. Supplementary References; 13. Representative chiral HPLC-MS data; 14. NMR Spectrum

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Li, ZQ., Hanley, D., Zhang, Y. et al. Chiral oxazolidinones via biocatalytic aziridination of unactivated alkenes. Nature (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11169-0

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  • DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-11169-0

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Original source Chiral oxazolidinones via biocatalytic aziridination of unactivated alkenes

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