Abstract:Cyanide is a high toxic reagent, and there are a large amount of cyanide containing wastewater and tailings in the gold smelting process, which urgently need to be treated. With the increasing improvement of environmental policies and the increasing awareness of environmental protection among people, green, non-toxic and non-cyanide gold leaching agents have gradually become a research hotspot. Over the past few decades, more than thirty non-cyanide gold leaching agents have been developed, including thiourea, thiosulfate, thiocyanate, halogenation, and amino acids. Due to the various technical barriers, the current development and application of non-cyanide gold leaching technology are mostly concentrated on laboratory scale or pilot scale. In view of this, this paper provides a detailed introduction to the properties of various gold leaching agents, elaborates and discusses the leaching mechanism of different agents, and prospects the potential industrial application of various non-cyanide gold leaching technologies.