text: Trisoxazolines can either be synthesised directly, from suitable tripodal starting materials, or built up in a modular manner. These approaches can be used to give ligands of differing symmetries, with the direct synthesis route giving homochiral ligands with C rotational symmetry and the modular approach typically being used to give asymmetric compounds (C symmetry), which are either heterochiral or possess a mix of both chiral and achiral groups. These differences in symmetry can significantly effect the coordination chemistry of the ligands and the catalytic activity of their complexes, with C symmetric ligands often being better for asymmetric catalysis.