This review emphasizes the role of phosphorus for the elaboration of dendrimers and of various highly sophisticated dendritic structures, and the invaluable role played by 31 P NMR for their characterization and to ascertain their purity. A few properties, highlighting the importance of phosphorus are reported at the end of this review.

Various methods of synthesis of phosphorus dendrimers are presented, in particular a fast method which allows creating each generation in only one step, while multiplying by 5 the number of end-groups. These methods of synthesis can easily be modified to place selectively on the surface, inside, within the branches or at the core, functional groups chosen according to the properties or the applications which they can bring. In many cases, the size of the dendrimer (its generation) has an influence on these properties. Various applications in the fields of catalysis, materials, and biology are presented.