Updated applications of flow chemistry in pharmaceutical synthesis

Abstract

As a further-developing process intensification technology, flow chemistry has achieved a striking development either in academic or industrial area in the past decade. Updated applications of flow chemistry in pharmaceutical synthesis are overviewed. Compared with its early research and development (R&D), current flow chemistry has already shown a lot of breakthroughs. For instance, no more limitations to the proof of feasibility concept for some certain reaction, public development of this technology by more and more distinguished international pharmaceutical companies and quite a few corresponding reports of successful examples about multistep total synthesis of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs). Different process categorizations are emphasized with many API syntheses to demonstrate the up-to-date progress of this topic, after a brief introduction of the advantages, existing challenges and the corresponding solutions for flow chemistry. © 2013 Chinese Chemical Society & SIOC, CAS.