Abstract We have investigated a diastereoselective self-replicating system based on a cycloaddition of a fulvene derivative and a maleimide using a two-pronged approach of combining NMR spectroscopy with computational modelling. Two diastereomers are formed with identical rates in the absence of replication. When replication is enabled, one diastereomer takes over the resources as a “selfish” autocatalyst, while exploiting the ...
