Monitoring solid phase synthesis by infrared spectroscopic techniques

The paper describes the use of attenuated total reflection fourier transfor m-infrared (ATR FT-IR) microspectroscopic techniques for the verification o f the structure of chemical compounds synthesised on polystyrene beads in c ombinatorial chemistry. A six step reaction sequence is characterised compl etely by infrared (IR) spectroscopic investigations of single beads. Incomp lete reactions or the occurrence of side products are clearly indicated. Qu antitative information can be extracted with high precision using absorptio n bands of the polymer matrix as internal standard. Compared to other IR te chniques, the ATR micro IR technique shows clear advantages with respect to sensitivity and resolution. The technique has the potential to be used for the characterisation of single beads in split and combined synthesis techn iques. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.