The extract from the plant Galega officinalis containing the guanidine derivative galegin has been used in the treatment of diabetes-associated complications since middle ages. Nevertheless, the positive effects of the treatment were often overweight by the adverse side effects. Some sixty years ago guanidin was replaced by the less toxic synthetic biguanide derivatives - metformin, phenphormin and buformin, the latter two being withdrawn due to the unacceptable risk of fatal lactate acidosis. Metformin is still widely used antidiabetics and belongs to the first choice drugs in the treatment of type 2 diabetes. Phenphormin is now gaining renewed attention with regard to its antineoplastic properties. Despite its long-term clinical use the mechanism of biguanides action is not fully understood yet. At present it is generally accepted that the core of its antihyperglycemic effect lays in the inhibition of hepatic gluconeogenesis. In contrast, there is less consensus regarding the particular metabolic pathway or target that are responsible for the metformin-induced attenuation of gluconeogenesis. For a long time, a hot candidate for metformin target in the cell was AMP-activated kinase (AMPK) but the metformin effect was proved also in mice carrying the dominant negative mutation of AMPK α subunit. Quite...