Molecularly imprinted polymers via high-throughput and combinatorial techniques

Techniques allowing high-throughput synthesis and evaluation of molecularly imprinted polymer sorbents at a reduced scale (mini-MIPs) have been, developed and used for the optimisation of MIPs for recognition of target molecules in various environments. The most. recent technique incorporates a liquid-handling robot for the rapid dispensing of monomers, templates, solvents and initiator into the reaction vessels of a 96-well plate. A library of 96 polymers, each of about 50 mg, can thus be prepared within 24 hours and the binding properties assessed within one to 1 two weeks by quantification of nonbound fractions in parallel. Examples of how mini-MIPs have been used as a tool to find superior MIPs for various targets (e.g. hydantoins, dihydropyridines pteridines, triazines, drug lead compounds) and how to optimise them for particular matrices will be given. Applications of the resulting materials encompass selective solid-phase extraction for quantitative analysis, chemical sensors, sorbents for preparative separations, screening tools in drug discovery and enzyme-like catalysis.