On‐line coupling of hollow fiber membranes with electrospray ionization mass spectrometry for continuous affinity selection, concentration and identification of small‐molecule libraries

Combinatorial chemistry has been widely employed in the pharmaceutical industry in the effort towards drug discovery. Rapid and sensitive screening of lead candidates among library compounds has thus imposed significant analytical challenges in recent years. This work involved the development of a continuous affinity capture and concentration system, providing cost‐effective and structural analysis of drug candidates in a flow‐through format. The system combines the strengths of a hollow fiber dialysis membrane of ease and speed of purification and concentration with the specificity of affinity interactions in solution. The complexes between the lead compounds and the affinity binding proteins are separated from other chemical components inside a dialysis hollow fiber as the result of their differences in size. The affinity complexes are further concentrated inside a second dialysis fiber. The concentrated drug candidates are liberated from the binding proteins in a microdialysis junction and can be directly identified using electrospray ionization mass spectrometry. Two model systems, including human serum albumin–warfarin‐related compounds and anti‐phenobarbital antibody–barbiturates, were employed for mechanistic studies of dialysis versus dissociation kinetics and competitive selection of drug candidates according to their binding strengths. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.