Stereochemistry, of cyclic derivatives

In view of this, a new overview of developments in this area is warranted, especially as no special summary on this subject has been published for some time. A comprehensive article2 in a previous volume of this series appeared in 1950. Subsequently, a brief discussion of 1,4 3,6-dianhydrohexitols was incorporated in a contribution on the stereochemistry of cyclic derivatives of carbohydrates,3 and they were treated exhaustively within a summary of alditol anhydrides that contained tables of physical properties of derivatives.4... 

Dr. Mills felt that he was tilling fertile ground, and he searched the carbohydrate literature for further examples. The result of this work was his article on The Stereochemistry of Cyclic Derivatives of Carbohydrates [This Series, 10,1-53 (1955)]. He had found his field. In the Introduction thereto he described his views on carbohydrate chemistry thus The writer, whose interests have lain mainly in the alicyclic field, has been greatly impressed by the scope that carbohydrate chemistry offers for elaborating and testing stereochemical hypotheses. Carbohydrates possess the desirable features of optical activity, crystallinity, and availability, and display a diversity in structural types and reactions that cannot be matched in other fields. . . Important contributions have, of course, already come from this source, but usually as by-products of the development of carbohydrate chemistry, rather than through the deliberate choice of carbohydrate compounds as models for experimental study. ... 

R. R Brady, Jr., Cyclic acetals of ketoses, Adv. Carbohydr. Chem Biochem 26 197 (1971). J. A. Mills, The stereochemistry of cyclic derivatives of carbohydrates, Adv. Carbohydr. Chem 10 1 (1955). 

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