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A molecular assembler that produces polymers

Molecular nanotechnology is a rapidly developing field, and tremendous progress has been made in developing synthetic molecular machines. One long-sought after nanotechnology is systems able to achieve the assembly-line like production of molecules. Here we report the discovery of a rudimentary synt...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Engwerda, Anthonius H. J., Fletcher, Stephen P.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2020
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7438324/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32814774
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-17814-0
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author Engwerda, Anthonius H. J.
Fletcher, Stephen P.
author_facet Engwerda, Anthonius H. J.
Fletcher, Stephen P.
author_sort Engwerda, Anthonius H. J.
collection PubMed
description Molecular nanotechnology is a rapidly developing field, and tremendous progress has been made in developing synthetic molecular machines. One long-sought after nanotechnology is systems able to achieve the assembly-line like production of molecules. Here we report the discovery of a rudimentary synthetic molecular assembler that produces polymers. The molecular assembler is a supramolecular aggregate of bifunctional surfactants produced by the reaction of two phase-separated reactants. Initially self-reproduction of the bifunctional surfactants is observed, but once it reaches a critical concentration the assembler starts to produce polymers instead of supramolecular aggregates. The polymer size can be controlled by adjusting temperature, reaction time, or introducing a capping agent. There has been considerable debate about molecular assemblers in the context of nanotechnology, our demonstration that primitive assemblers may arise from simple phase separated reactants may provide a new direction for the design of functional supramolecular systems.
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spelling pubmed-74383242020-08-28 A molecular assembler that produces polymers Engwerda, Anthonius H. J. Fletcher, Stephen P. Nat Commun Article Molecular nanotechnology is a rapidly developing field, and tremendous progress has been made in developing synthetic molecular machines. One long-sought after nanotechnology is systems able to achieve the assembly-line like production of molecules. Here we report the discovery of a rudimentary synthetic molecular assembler that produces polymers. The molecular assembler is a supramolecular aggregate of bifunctional surfactants produced by the reaction of two phase-separated reactants. Initially self-reproduction of the bifunctional surfactants is observed, but once it reaches a critical concentration the assembler starts to produce polymers instead of supramolecular aggregates. The polymer size can be controlled by adjusting temperature, reaction time, or introducing a capping agent. There has been considerable debate about molecular assemblers in the context of nanotechnology, our demonstration that primitive assemblers may arise from simple phase separated reactants may provide a new direction for the design of functional supramolecular systems. Nature Publishing Group UK 2020-08-19 /pmc/articles/PMC7438324/ /pubmed/32814774 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-17814-0 Text en © The Author(s) 2020 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Engwerda, Anthonius H. J.
Fletcher, Stephen P.
A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title_full A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title_fullStr A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title_full_unstemmed A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title_short A molecular assembler that produces polymers
title_sort molecular assembler that produces polymers
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7438324/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32814774
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-17814-0
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