SONS EUROCORES: Proposal 05-SONS-FP-014 Liquid Crystal Nanoparticles - LC-NANOP

液晶（LC）是现代最典型的自组织分子材料。它们可以在电、磁和机械领域中容易地重新定向，这导致了过多的应用，例如导致了电光显示器市场的主导地位。大多数液晶被设计为用于显示器的低摩尔量材料（例如4-烷基-4 '-氰基联苯）或用于高屈服强度聚合物的高分子量材料（例如Kevlar TM和VectraTM）。与现有材料相比，纳米结构的LC可以将联合收割机自组织与形成二级和三级结构的能力相结合，其结构层次类似于蛋白质。此外，超分子和超分子LC可以表现出各种物理性质，这使得它们在纳米科学，材料和生物学领域的应用具有吸引力。我们预测，未来的材料研究和LC的应用将集中在各种令人兴奋的主题，这反映了我们控制复杂/巨分子系统的自组织，自组装和微观分离过程的能力，以产生可寻址的，自组织的纳米结构。材料本身将被设计和合成，具有智能和多功能特性。它们的应用将跨越边界，从先进的技术设备到智能生物材料/传感器，甚至到发现新的物质状态。期待这样令人兴奋的发展，我们打算利用LC独特的自组织能力，以自下而上的方法来创建有序的纳米颗粒阵列，而不是目前使用的，但自我限制，自上而下的方法（例如纳米光刻）。通过这种方法，我们将能够制备具有特定内置功能的分层混合结构的液晶纳米颗粒。该计划的主要挑战是具有内置功能的超分子和超分子材料的合理设计，合成（纯和/或放大）和表征，这些材料将自组织和/或自组装，以产生具有实际重要性的新材料或物质状态。因此，借助于模拟，将液晶纳米颗粒设计成纳米颗粒（例如，倍半硅氧烷、碳硅烷、金、银、二氧化钛、病毒和孢子等）的形式作为中心支架，并且其中支架可以是多层的。围绕支架的是液晶涂层，其可以衍生自球形、盘状或棒状介晶单元。外涂层可以由一个或多个介晶层组成，其又可以容纳另外的功能单元（例如光致变色）。然而，介晶涂层具有为核心纳米颗粒提供自组织和最终自组装载体的特定目的。如所指出的，尽管示出为球形，但支架不必是球形的。此外，它们可以被设计成在其结构内具有孔和腔，从而允许形成离子通道和结合位点

Liquid crystals (LCs) are the quintessential, self-organising, molecular materials of the modern era. The ease with which they can be reoriented in electrical, magnetic and mechanical fields has led to a plethora of applications, resulting, for example, in the dominance of the electro-optic displays market. Most LCs have been designed as either low molar-weight materials for displays (eg 4-alkyl-4'-cyanobiphenyls) or high molecular-weight materials for high yield-strength polymers (eg KevlarTM, and VectraTM). In contrast to existing materials, nano-structured LCs can combine self-organisation with the ability to form secondary and tertiary structures, in a structural hierarchy similar to that found for proteins. Furthermore, super- and supra-molecular LCs can exhibit a variety of physical properties which make them attractive for applications in the fields of nano-science, materials and biology. We predict that future materials research and applications of LCs will be focused on a variety of exciting topics, which reflect our ability to control self-organising, self-assembling and micro-segregating processes of complex/giant molecular systems to yield addressable, self-organised nano-structures. The materials themselves will be property designed and synthesised with smart and often multifunctional characteristics. Their applications will spread across the boundaries from advanced technological devices through to smart bio-materials/sensors, even to the discovery of new states of matter . Anticipating such exciting developments, we intend to utilise the unique self-organising abilities of LCs in a bottom-up approach to the creation of ordered arrays of nano-particles, rather than the currently used, but self-limiting, top-down methodologies (eg nanolithography). In taking this approach, we will be able to prepare liquid-crystalline nano-particles with hierarchical hybrid structures with specific built-in functionality. The primary challenges in this programme are the rational design, synthesis (pure and/or with up-scaling) and characterization of super- and supra-molecular materials with in-built functionalities, which will self-organise and/or self-assemble in order to yield novel materials or states of matter of practical importance. Thus, the liquid-crystalline nano-particles will be designed, with the aid of simulations, in the form of a nano-particle (eg, silsesquioxanes, carbosilanes gold, silver, titania, viruses and spores etc) as the central scaffold, and where the scaffold may be multilayered. Surrounding the scaffold is a liquid-crystalline coat , which may be derived from spherical, disc- or rod-like mesogenic units. The external coat may consist of one or more mesogenic layers, which in turn can accommodate further functional units (eg photochromic). The mesogenic coat, however, has the specific purpose of providing the self-organising, and ultimately self-assembling, vehicle for the core nano-particles. As noted although shown as spherical, the scaffolds do not necessary have to be spherical. Furthermore, they can be designed to have holes and cavities within their structures, thereby allowing formation of ion channels and binding sites