Over the last ten years, ionic liquids (IL) has received considerable attention owing to their high thermal and chemistry stability, good solubility, low toxicity, low volatility, reusability and incombustibility. Chiral ionic liquids (CIL) as a sorts of special liquids has its intriguing properties, which can be used to chiral discrimination, optical resolution of racemates, chiral staionary phase and so on. Moreover, it can be used effectively as solvents and catalysts in asymmetric reactions. This report provides an overview of recent progress in the synthesis of chiral ionic liquids including imidazolium-based, pyridinium-based, quaternary ammonium or ammonium-based, thiazolinium-based and other chiral salts in the mainly past five years.

Key words: chirality, ionic liquid, synthesis