Recent Advances in Transition Metal-Catalyzed Synthesis of Guanidines

Guanidines are a unique class of tri-nitrogen compounds having various bioactivities, which are wildly presented in natural products and drug molecules, and they are wildly used in pharmacy and pesticide fields. Moreover, they have high application value in organic synthesis and functional materials. The synthesis of guanidines has received much attention due to their unique structures and widespread application value. Recently, lots of new synthetic methods of guanidines, especially the synthetic methods based on highly efficient transition metal-catalyzed reactions, have been developed. The recent progress in transition metal-catalyzed reactions developed for the synthesis of guanidines in the past twenty years is summarized. The synthetic methods for various guanidines are introduced comprehensively, and the characteristics and disadvantages of these methods are also discussed, thus it may be helpful for the research on transition metal-catalyzed synthesis of guanidines.