Asymmetric Synthesis, Volume 4: The Chiral Carbon Pool and Chiral Sulfur, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Silicon Centers describes the practical methods of obtaining chiral fragments. Divided into five chapters, this book specifically examines initial chiral transmission and extension. The opening chapter describes the so-called chiral carbon pool, the readily available chiral carbon fragments used as building blocks in synthesis. This chapter also provides a list of 375 chiral building blocks, along with their commercial sources, approximate prices, and methods of synthesis. Schemes involving almost 1, 300 structures and the use of chiral building blocks to prepare alkaloids, arachidonic acid metabolites, compounds with chemotherapeutic and pharmacological activity, insect pheromones, sugars, vitamins, terpenoids, and miscellaneous compounds are also included in this text. The remaining chapters provide a similar overview of the chemistry of compounds chiral at sulfur, phosphorus, nitrogen, and silicon. Synthetic chemists and researchers, especially those engaged in pharmaceutical research and specialty chemicals production, will find this book invaluable.