Combinatorial materials synthesis

The pace at which major technological changes take place is often dictated by the rate at which new materials are discovered, and the timely arrival of new materials has always played a key role in bringing advances to our society. It is no wonder then that the so-called combinatorial or high-throughput strategy has been embraced by practitioners of materials science in virtually every field. High-throughput experimentation allows simultaneous synthesis and screening of large arrays of different materials. Pioneered by the pharmaceutical industry, the combinatorial method is now widely considered to be a watershed in accelerating the discovery and optimization of new materials1–5.