Nitrile oxides: a key intermediate in organic synthesis.

Nitrile oxides have an illustrious history, some even known back in the nineteenth century, fruitful development of the generation and their utility in synthetic principle has been achieved only in recent years. The nitrile oxides were considered as a versatile key intermediates and acts as efficient 1,3-dipole in 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reactions. The cycloaddition of nitrile oxides with various dipolarophiles leads to the formation of wide range of five membered heterocyclic compounds such as isoxazoles, isoxazolines, oxadiazoles, oxadiazolines, dioxazolidines etc. An up to date information about the methodologies adopted for the generation of nitrile oxides, their utility in organic synthesis, stereochemistry of the products have been presented in this review article.