The cheap and easily available nonmetal selenium catalyst possesses both efficiency to catalytically activate carbon monoxide and the function of phase-transfer catalysis. What is more, it can be recycled. Substitution of noble metal catalyzed carbonylation and virulent phosgene methods with Se/CO catalytic system to carry out carbonylation reaction, together with applying Se/CO/H2O to carry out highly selective reduction, has many advantages such as mild reaction conditions, high atomic economy, low cost, benign environment, short synthesis approach and simple operation, which arouse broad attention. This review focuses on the recent progress in the selenium-catalyzed carbonylation and the selenium-catalyzed selective reduction. Finally, the development trend of the selenium-catalyzed reactions is prospected.

Key words: selenium-catalyzed carbonylation, selenium-catalyzed reduction, CO