Folding of Synthetic Supramolecular Blockcopolymers

凭借该奖项，化学部的大分子，超分子和纳米化学计划支持纽约大学的Marcus Weck教授开发结构明确的3D超分子聚合物科学。 据推测，下一代复杂的，多样的，和高度功能化的聚合物的电光，光学，生物，能源相关，生物医学，和基于计算机的应用将是基于自组装的三维结构。 利用非共价化学，Weck教授的研究小组开发了用于此类应用的聚合物基结构形成的新策略。 该项目将尖端研究与本科生和研究生的培训结合起来。 此外，Weck教授和他的学生积极参与教育发展计划，以提高K-12学童对聚合物科学的理解和教学。 例如，每两个月在PI实验室接待一次三年级和四年级的内城学校儿童以及学龄前儿童，并通过一系列非常基本的演示向他们介绍聚合物科学的兴奋。 研究设计是基于超分子嵌段共聚物的制造，使用即插即用策略与明确定义的遥爪聚合物构建块的库，其中定向和非定向相互作用影响最终的折叠结构。 具体而言，Weck教授的小组开发了用于制造共价和非共价三嵌段共聚物的合成方法，这些共聚物包含螺旋，片状和棒状-线圈状片段，并使用定向和非定向相互作用研究这些共聚物的折叠行为。 他的团队进行了系统的结构-性质关系研究，以阐明特定的非共价相互作用对聚合物构建块的自组装行为的影响。 这种“即插即用”策略的使用允许通过设计实现三级和四级聚合物结构。

With this award, the Macromolecular, Supramolecular and Nanochemistry Program of the Chemistry Division supports Professor Marcus Weck at New York University to develop the science of architecturally well-defined 3D supramolecular polymers. It has been postulated that the next generation of complex, diverse, and highly functionalized polymers for electro-optical, optical, biological, energy-related, biomedical, and computer-based applications will be based on self-assembled three-dimensional architectures. Taking advantage of non-covalent chemistries, Prof. Weck's research group develops new strategies for the formation of polymer-based architectures for such applications. This project pairs cutting edge research with the training of undergraduate and graduate students. In addition, Prof. Weck and his students actively participate in educational development programs to enhance the understanding and teaching of polymer science to K-12 school children. Examples include hosting bimonthly third and fourth grade inner city school children as well as pre-school children in the PIs laboratory and introducing them to the excitement of polymer science through a series of very basic demonstrations. The research design is based on the fabrication of supramolecular block copolymers using a plug-and-play strategy with a library of well-defined telechelic polymer building blocks wherein both directional and non-directional interactions influence final folded structures. Specifically, Prof. Weck's group develops synthetic methodology for the fabrication of covalent and noncovalent triblock copolymers that contain helical, sheet-like, and rod-coil like segments and studies the folding behavior of these copolymers using directional and non-directional interactions. His group performs systematic structure-property relationship studies to elucidate the effect of specific noncovalent interactions on the self-assembly behavior of the polymeric building blocks. This use of a 'plug-and-play' strategy allows for the realization of tertiary and quaternary polymeric structures by design.