High-resolution mass spectra (HRMS) of individual spots on thin-layer chromatography (TLC) slides can now be obtained quickly and easily at atmospheric pressure, with zero sample preparation, using commercially available instrumentation. The method is complementary to GC-mass spectrometry but is not limited to compounds of high volatility and high thermal stability. TLC-HRMS can be used to monitor chemical reactions in real time and has the capacity thereby to accelerate significantly the pace of synthetic organic chemistry.
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Smith et al. (2008) studied this question.