Engineering discrete stacks of aromatic molecules

Intrigued by transannular interactions occurring in stacked aromatic molecules, chemists have long endeavored to engineer discrete stacks of specific lengths and orientation. The maturation of self-assembly methodologies has shifted the focus away from utilizing covalent scaffolds to harnessing non-covalent interactions such as ionic interactions, hydrogen bonds, metal–ligand interactions, and aromatic interactions. Aromatic molecules often assemble into ill-defined, infinite aggregates and thus multiple self-assembly techniques must be combined to achieve the desired stack size and conformations. This critical review briefly highlights covalent scaffolds of stack aromatics before focusing on modern self-assembly based strategies for engineering discrete stacks of aromatic molecules (149 references).