“Multi-component Reactions : Emerging Chemistry in Drug Discovery” ‘From Xylocain to Crixivan’

With the recent emergence of combinatorial chemistry and high-speed parallel synthesis for drug discovery applications, the multi-component reaction (MCR) has seen a resurgence of interest. Easily automated one-pot reactions, such as the Ugi and Passerini reactions, are powerful tools for producing diverse arrays of compounds, often in one step and high yield. Despite this synthetic potential, the Ugi reaction is limited by producing products that are flexible and peptide-like, often being classified as 'non drug-like'. This review details developments of new, highly atom-economic MCR derived chemical methods, which enable the fast and efficient production of chemical libraries comprised of a variety of…