The nanoscaled, structurally well-defined inorganic clusters are valuable models to examine the solution physical chemistry of hydrophilic macroions, as their sizes (1-6 nm) fall into the transition region which both the traditional Debye-Huckel Theory for ionic solutions and  the DLVO Theory for colloids do not apply. The moderate and tunable macroion-counterion interaction provides unique features for such solutions, from the self-assembly of soluble macroions into blackberry-type structures with accurately tunable sizes, the capability of accurately selecting the preferred counterions among various monovalent cations, to the self-recognition property during self-assembly.<br/>Functioning the inorganic clusters with organic ligands further introduces more interactions for consideration. Various non-covalent forces, from van der Waals forces, electrostatic interaction, hydrogen bonding, hydrophobic interaction, p-p stacking to counterion-p interaction, may co-exist in such solutions and cooperatively controlling the stability and the self-assembly behaviors. This talk will discuss how the major force(s) can be identified for different processes, and how to experimentally measure the change of the force strength via the phase transitions (crystallization/precipitation) and/or the detectable changes of self-assembled structures (e.g., size of blackberry structures, blackberry-to-tubular transition, surfactant-related morphology transitions…) in solution. The studies were based on the samples provided by several key collaborators in the field of inorganic chemistry, including Leroy Cronin's group.<br/>

Nanoscaled inorganic clusters and inorganic-organic hybrid macromolecules - ideal models for solution physical chemistry

256th National Meeting (2018)

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