Importance of Precursor Adaptability in the Assembly of Molecular Organic Cages

For molecular architectures based on dynamic covalent chemistry (DCvC), strict preorganization is a paradigmatic concept and the generally accepted strategy for their rational design. This results in the creation of highly rigid building blocks which are expected to fulfill the ideal geometry of the assembly, coming at a price that small geometric mismatches result in unpredicted and/or unproductive reaction outcomes. In this study, we show that feet of a tripodal platform have a great influence on the assembly of tetrahedral organic cages based on boronate ester formation. The aryl benzyl ether-functionalized building blocks perform significantly better than their alkyl-functionalized equivalents. Experimentally and using density functional theory geometry optimization of the cage structures, we prove that unexpectedly, this is not due to solubility but because of the enhanced capability of the aryl benzyl ether-functionalized building blocks to fit the ideal geometry of the assembly. This introduces the concept of building block adaptability to overcome geometrical mismatches in DCvC systems.

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Rondelli, Manuel, Hernández Daranas, Antonio, Martín, Tomás
Other Authors: Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (España)
Format: artículo biblioteca
Language:English
Published: ACS Publications 2023-02-02
Subjects:Precursor adaptability, assembly, molecular organic cages,
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10261/296862
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