Spatiotemporal Segregation of Chiral Supramolecular Polymers

Abstract

Programmable spatiotemporal control over the formation of functional supramolecular polymers, which leads to the formation of different morphological forms in solution, is one of the long-standing issues in chemistry. The situation is even more complex especially when dealing with a mixture of species in multicomponent self-assemblies. One way to achieve this goal is by controlling the spatiotemporal distribution of the molecular components in solution, which control the overall aggregation process. Herein, we report the spatiotemporal segregation of different redox-responsive supramolecular assemblies inside spatiotemporal domains generated within the same solution under out-of-equilibrium conditions by using audible sound. Using this approach, we can spatiotemporally control the formation of at least two types of assemblies, which are either both achiral or one of them is chiral, or both are chiral but with opposite helicity. This strategy may provide advanced control over solution-state synthesis of supramolecular polymers, which exhibit morphology-dependent functions.