Used in peptide synthesis as a non-natural amino acid building block, Ac-DL-Abu-OH serves as an intermediate in the development of pharmaceuticals and bioactive peptides. Its acetylated form helps modulate peptide stability and conformation, improving resistance to enzymatic degradation. It is also employed in research settings to study enzyme specificity and metabolic pathways involving amino acid analogs. Due to its structural similarity to natural amino acids, it can be incorporated into peptide chains to probe structure-activity relationships or enhance lipophilicity for membrane permeability studies.