| Combinatorial Chemistry |
Article Index for Combinatorial |
Website Links For Combinatorial |
Information AboutCombinatorial Chemistry |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT COMBINATORIAL CHEMISTRY | |
| cheminformatics | |
|
INTRODUCTION Synthesis of molecules in a combinatorial fashion can quickly lead to large numbers of molecules. For example, a molecule with three points of diversity (''R''1, ''R''2, and ''R''3) can generate possible structures, where , , and are the number of different substituents utilized. Although combinatorial chemistry has only really been taken up by industry since the 1990 s, its roots can be seen as far back as the 1960 s when a researcher at Rockefeller University , Bruce Merrifield , started investigating the Solid-phase Synthesis of Peptide s. In the 1980 s researcher H. Mario Geysen developed this technique further, creating arrays of different peptides on separate supports. In its modern form, combinatorial chemistry has probably had its biggest impact in the Pharmaceutical industry. Researchers attempting to optimize the activity profile of a compound create a 'library' of many different but related compounds. Advances in Robotics have led to an industrial approach to combinatorial synthesis, enabling companies to routinely produce over 100,000 new and unique compounds per year (see Medicinal Chemistry ). In order to handle the vast number of structural possibilities, researchers often create a 'virtual library', a computational enumeration of all possible structures of a given Pharmacophore with all available Reactant s. Such a library can consist of thousand to millions of 'virtual' compounds. The researcher will select a subset of the 'virtual library' for actual synthesis, based upon various calculations and criteria (see ADME , Computational Chemistry , and QSAR ). , GE , etc). TRIVIA In the 8th edition of the International Patent Classification (IPC), which will enter into force on January 1 , 2006 , a special subclass has been created for Patent Application s and Patent s related to Invention s in the domain of combinatorial chemistry: "C40B". EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|