Combinatorial chemistry: A powerful tool for basic research and drug discovery

This article is an introduction to the area of combinatorial chemistry. Although it is by no means a comprehensive survey of the subject, it can serve as a source of basic information about this field. It discusses several issues including chemical diversity measurements, synthesis methods (solid-phase synthesis and synthesis in solution), number of compounds needed for a particular screening project, use of mixtures vs single compounds in the screening, design of flexible vs rigid compounds, importance of application of purified or crude products, and amount of each compound needed for a particular project.