An Appreciation of the Scientific Life and Achievements of Bruce Merrifield

摘要

Bruce Merrifield's scientific biography, "Life During a Golden Age of Peptide Chemistry: The Concept and Development of Solid-Phase Peptide Synthesis," provides a history of solid phase-peptide synthesis (SPPS) from 1959 to 1993 [1]. While many readers will be familiar with SPPS literature after 1963, the inclusion of unpublished material from Merrifield's early laboratory notebooks opens a fascinating window on the development of SPPS from the formulation of concept in 1959 (p. 56, ref. 1) to the synthesis of a tetrapeptide four years later [2]. This early period was characterized by slow progress interrupted by numerous setbacks that led Bruce to later record (p. 90, ref 1): "At the end of the first two years the results were so poor, I wonder what made me think that this approach would ever succeed. But from the outset I had a strong conviction that this was a good idea, and I am glad that I stayed with it long enough". Garland Marshall, Brace's first graduate student (1963-1966), as well as later colleagues, were essentially unaware of the many highways, byways and dead ends that Bruce had explored in the early years [3].