Nitrogen-containing heterocycles and their derivatives have broad application in synthetic, materials, and biological chemistry, and as a result their synthesis and reactivity are subjects of considerable interest.[1] Generation of chiral Nheteroaromatic derivatives in optically active form is a challenging facet of this research area that has seen important, but somewhat uneven progress.[2] For example, neither stoichiometric nor catalytic asymmetric conjugate additions of nitrogen-centered nucleophiles based on N-heterocyclic structures has been developed, despite the impressive recent advances in the general area of 1,4-addition chemistry and the utility that the resulting products might hold. [3,4] Potential applications might include preparation of novel non-natural nucleosides (NNNs), [5] a class of compounds with a broad range of important biological applications. [6,7] Our group demonstrated recently that [(salen)Al] complexes efficiently catalyze the highly enantioselective conjugate addition of HN 3 , [8a,e] HCN, [8b] electron-deficient nitrile derivatives, [8c,e] and oximes [8d] to a,b-unsaturated imides and ketones in the absence of added base. As each of these nucleophiles includes a relatively acidic X À H (X = N, C, O) bond (pK a 5-17), we hypothesized that heterocyclic compounds bearing similarly acidic NÀH bonds might be suitable reaction partners in [(salen)Al]-catalyzed conjugate additions. Herein, we report the successful development of catalytic asymmetric conjugate additions of aromatic N-heterocycles to a,b-unsaturated carbonyl compounds. Both a,b-unsaturated imides and ketones undergo efficient and highly regio-and enantioselective additions with a variety of both fused and nonfused aromatic heterocyclic compounds. This methodology introduces a new, versatile synthetic method for the preparation of interesting chiral building blocks, including NNNs.Purine, the structural core of the nucleobases in the most promising antiviral agents, [7a] was chosen as a model substrate. It contains a relatively acidic NÀH bond (pK a 8.6) and is known to exist in two (N7-H and N9-H) tautomeric forms.[9a]The oxo-bridged dimeric catalyst 1[8c] was found to promote the addition of purine to 3-hepten-2-one (2 b) in the absence of external base. The reaction resulted in full conversion into