Issue 9, 2019

Towards homochiral supramolecular entities from achiral molecules by vortex mixing-accompanied self-assembly

Abstract

Achieving homochirality is challenging both at the molecular and the supramolecular levels. While the origin of molecular homochirality still remains mysterious, the fabrication of homochiral assemblies from achiral molecules has attracted considerable interest since it provides many clues to understand the origin of molecular chirality. Here, by using a vortex mixing-accompanied self-assembly strategy, we obtained near-unity homochiral entities with controlled handedness from supramolecular gels that consist of exclusively achiral molecules without any chiral additives. The common supramolecular gelation process via heating and cooling of the achiral molecules only resulted in racemic gels. However, if vortex mixing is applied during the self-assembly, near-unity homochiral assemblies with uncontrolled handedness were obtained. Vortex mixing during the nucleation stage was found to be crucial in this case. On the other hand, if a small amount of the above vortex mixing produced assemblies was added as chiral seeds into the racemic gels, the racemic gels turned into near-unity homochiral suspensions with controlled handedness via a ripening process. Our studies provide an intriguing approach for achieving homochiral supramolecular assemblies from achiral molecules.

Graphical abstract: Towards homochiral supramolecular entities from achiral molecules by vortex mixing-accompanied self-assembly

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Edge Article
Submitted
21 okt 2018
Accepted
06 jan 2019
First published
07 jan 2019
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY license

Chem. Sci., 2019,10, 2718-2724

Towards homochiral supramolecular entities from achiral molecules by vortex mixing-accompanied self-assembly

Y. Sang, D. Yang, P. Duan and M. Liu, Chem. Sci., 2019, 10, 2718 DOI: 10.1039/C8SC04687E

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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