The synthesis of Bcr-Abl inhibiting anticancer pharmaceutical agents imatinib, nilotinib and dasatinib.

Imatinib (1), nilotinib (2) and dasatinib (3) are Bcr-Abl tyrosine kinase inhibitors approved for the treatment of chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML). This review collates information from the journal and patent literature to provide a comprehensive reference source of the different synthetic methods used to prepare the aforementioned active pharmaceutical ingredients (API's).