Chirality and asymmetric synthesis Chirality is an interesting phenomenon in nature. A lot of objects such as hands, shells and even molecures possess this property. For example, chiral amino acids are frequently found in many biologically active peptides and natural products. Asymmetric synthesis of useful chiral molecules has been an important part in pharmaceutical industry since the last century. Non-proteinogenic amino acids As building blocks of many biologically active compounds, chiral non-proteinogenic amino acids, esspeciallyα,β-diamino acids, such as L-quisqualic acid, were found to possess biological significance, therapeutic uses, and other useful applications. However, as an atypical kind of amino acids, α,β-diamino acids were less well studied, especially with regard to their asymmetric synthesis. A green approach The conventional and still commonly used methods of asymmetric synthesis of chiral molecules involve heavy metal complexes as catalysts since they provide very good yields and selectivities. However, the use of these heavy metals has a significant negative impact on the our living environment. Thus, our research aimed to achieve a more efficient, economical and operationally simple approach towards the asymmetric synthesis of protected α,β-diamino acids. [3rd Awards]