The 2-aminothiazole ring is an important structural motif found in numerous biologically active molecules which exhibits a wide range of activities such as antibacterial [
1], anti-inflammatory [
2], anticancer [
3], anti-hypertension [
4] and anti HIV [
5]. In addition, 2-aminothiazole ring is frequently found in a variety of market drug such as famotidine [
6], cefdinir [
7], meloxicam [
8] and so on. Besides, in 2019 we reported structure-based design of
N-(5-phenylthiazol-2-yl)acrylamides as novel and potent glutathione
S-transferase omega 1 (GSTO1-1) inhibitors [
9], showing that thiazole derivatives are potential and suitable leading compounds for cancer therapy (
Fig. 1). Due to the importance and the broad utility of 2-aminothiazole derivatives, diverse well-established methods have been developed to construct these structural motifs. The Hantzsch synthesis is the most commonly used typical method using
α-halocarbonyl compounds and thioureas/thioamides for the synthesis of 2-aminothiazoles (
Scheme 1) [
10]. Over the years, many improved methods have been reported involving the use of catalysts such as ammonium 12-molybdophosphate [
11],
β-cyclodextrin [
12], iodine [
13] and silica chloride [
14], new starting materials from
α-nitroepoxides and thiocyanate [
15]-
18], green solvent such as ionic liquids [
19], PEG-400 [
20] and water [
21], and with the aid of microwaves [
22,
23]. And some valuable methods have also been developed for constructing fused polycyclic thiazole rings [
24,
25]. Despite the progress, some limitations still remain. For example, mostly using
α-halocarbonyl compounds as the starting materials is inevitable, which lead to the generation of much chemical waste. Faced with these thorny problems, developing more efficient and sustainable synthetic strategies remains highly desirable.