Issue: March / April 2024

Early drug discovery programmes have undergone continuous improvements over the past two decades. The industry has seen a dramatic shift towards the acceptance and implementation of continuous flow techniques, as researchers seek to implement new enabling technologies to reduce the time and cost of bringing novel drugs to market. Flow chemistry has made an impact in most areas of drug discovery, enabling access to new chemistries that are not possible with traditional batch methods, improving reaction efficiencies, saving resources, and enhancing process safety. This article looks at how the development of automated techniques – combined with integrated synthesis, purification and analysis – has greatly increased the speed with which novel compounds can be delivered to rapidly progress early stages of drug discovery.

The benefits of using flow chemistry for fast, very exothermic, and dangerous processes has been widely acknowledged and demonstrated within the last few decades. Discussed in this article are the particular advantages that can be gained when using continuous processing for the formation and consumption of magnesium and zinc organometallic intermediates especially considering significant process improvements in terms of safety, scalability, selectivity, and sustainability. Appropriate technology applicable to the process, its scalability, and its application for a particular magnesium- and zinc-based reagent emphasizes that continuous processing can be used for either metal interchangeably depending on reagent processing needs.