International Collaboration in Chemistry: Structural Mechanostereochemistry of Mechanically Interlocked Polymers and Networks

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This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).The Organic and Macromolecular Chemistry Program in the Chemistry Division at the National Science Foundation supports a proposal from Professor Fraser J. Stoddart of Northwestern University. This proposal, submitted in response to solicitation NSF 08-602: International Collaboration in Chemistry between US Investigators and their Counterparts Abroad (ICC), is a collaboration with Alexandra M Z. Slawin at St Andrews University in Scotland. The team will develop the chemistry of mechanically interlocking molecules (MIMs) into higher ordered network materials and characterize these materials by a range of physical techniques, most importantly, single crystal X-ray crystallography. The structural results will be used to inform the development of the chemistry as the results are fed back into the design and synthesis of the new materials. The combination of these two teams to tackle the development of multi-dimensional mechanically interlocking molecules represents a significant advance in the area and will be of benefit and interest to a wide range of academics working in the area of supramolecular chemistry. The resultant materials obtained will have enormous potential in a variety of industrial applications.The broader impacts will present an opportunity for students to work on highly interdisciplinary research that enables the pursuit of grand scientific challenges. There is a well-planned and extensive program for exchanging students between Northwestern University and St. Andrews University, as well as regular cross-institutional visits by the PIs that will be aided by state-of-the-art communication aids, e.g., video conferencing, teleconferencing, and web-based data-sharing. Both PIs support their institution?s initiative to bring students into the classrooms from underrepresented groups. At Northwestern University, Professor Stoddart runs a research group focused on synthetic and physical organic chemistry with postdoctoral fellows drawn from all around the world, currently including Canada, China, Germany, India, Lebanon, Mexico, Scotland, and Turkey as well as the US. His present graduate students include Asian and Hispanic Americans, as well as women from the US and abroad. At St. Andrews University, Professor Slawin runs a world-class X-ray diffraction facility with unique support activities (e.g., Automated Crystallization Facility) in a highly interactive manner with postdoctoral, graduate and undergraduate students from the UK, the EU, and non-EU countries. The value-added and enhanced experience, for research performance and academic quality and for the education and training of students in both groups, will be at a remarkably invigorating level because of the complementary skills that will be gained through collaboration between these two very different laboratories.