​Nature provides endless examples of precisely engineered macromolecules; proteins, for instance, which contain amino-acid side-chains that are accurately positioned, often in a way that determines the proteins’ roles. Chemists are remarkably proficient at directing the synthesis of small molecules, but fine-tuning the structures of large molecules, such as those found in polymers, is far more taxing. Despite many years of research, the field of macromolecular engineering i.e. the preparation of large molecules with strict control over their 2D / 3D structure and chemical groups has many challenges yet to overcome.<br/>The lecture will describe new synthetic paths to design macromolecules showing excellent control over their topology and functionality. We have combined organic synthesis, polymerisation processes and supramolecular chemistry to design polymeric nanostructures showing a hierarchical structure, from controlled monomer sequence (1D) to architectures (2D) to self-assembly (3D). The exploitation of these nanostructured materials will be discussed, with examples of applications in the material and biomedical fields.

Hierarchical polymeric nanostructures from precision polymer chemistry

249th National Meeting (2015)

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