Real-Time Reaction Monitoring of a Solution-Phase Peptide Synthesis using the Plate Express^™ and expression^® TLC/CMS

Real-time reaction monitoring based on a combination of thin-layer chromatography (TLC) and compact mass spectrometry (CMS) is a simple and quick way for chemists to overcome synthetic challenges and optimize chemical reactions in the modern laboratory.  Peptides of pharmaceutical  interest can be readily synthesized following a rapid, continuous solution-phase synthesis strategy based on Fmoc protected amino acid building blocks. A simple model for such a reaction is the growing of analogues of the acyl carrier protein (ACP), a component of the fatty acid synthesis pathway.