It is a white solid that is used as a reagent for preparing active esters in peptide synthesis.

[2] NHS is commonly found in organic chemistry or biochemistry where it is used as an activating reagent for carboxylic acids.

A common way to synthesize an NHS-activated acid is to mix NHS with the desired carboxylic acid and a small amount of an organic base in an anhydrous solvent.

A coupling reagent such as dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC) or 1-ethyl-3-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)carbodiimide (EDC) is then added to form a highly reactive activated acid intermediate.

[4] Some alternatives to NHS are the water-soluble analog sulfo-NHS, hydroxybenzotriazole (HOBt), 1-hydroxy-7-azabenzotriazole (HOAt), and pentafluorophenol.