Acoustic Droplet Ejection Enabled Automated Reaction Scouting

Abstract

Miniaturization and acceleration of synthetic chemistry are critically important for rapid property optimization in pharmaceutical, agrochemical, and materials research and development. However, in most laboratories organic synthesis is still performed on a slow, sequential, and material-consuming scale and not validated for multiple substrate combinations. Herein, we introduce fast and touchless acoustic droplet ejection (ADE) technology into small-molecule chemistry to transfer building blocks by nL droplets and to scout a newly designed isoquinoline synthesis. With each compound in a discrete well, 384 random derivatives were synthesized in an automated fashion, and their quality was monitored by SFC-MS and TLC-UV-MS analysis. We exemplify a pipeline of fast and efficient nmol scouting to mmol- and mol-scale synthesis for the discovery of a useful novel reaction with great scope.