Hierarchical Self-Assembly Based on Surface-Confined Foldamers: A Bottom-up Approach to Nanopatterning (SURCONFOLD)

等级自组装在自然界中无处不在。它形成了从小蛋白质到多细胞生物自组装的基本构建技术。然而，要制造出能与这些自然系统的功能相媲美的人造纳米结构，仍然是一个巨大的挑战。在surconold中，我们通过开发一种真正的分层方法来解决这一挑战，该方法允许在0.5- 20nm的空间分辨率下，在各种界面上完全控制多个不同功能基团的二维空间定位。为此，我们将采用表面受限的折叠物，即具有可调序列和整合功能的寡聚分子，它们吸附在液固界面并折叠成明确的构象。这些具有定义形状的2D受限物体随后将自组装成规则的2D图案，时间和空间分辨表征将被用来解开复杂的折叠和自组装行为。对文件夹链序列和二维构象的控制将实现各种不同化学实体的精确空间排列，这可以用于功能基团的精确空间排列，如供体-受体型发色团、催化活性基团或识别位点，从而为光电材料、催化剂或传感器带来新的机会。因此，我们的方法涉及几个层次组织水平，以特定单体序列的形式将分子水平上的信息传递到整体组装的真正的杂交材料，从而提供对表面功能化的化学性质和空间安排的精细控制。因此，surconold将采用跨学科的方法，涉及有机，聚合物和物理化学家，并具有互补的专业知识，在新兴的材料和纳米科学领域产生新的知识，并在传感，光电子学和催化方面产生潜在的影响。

Hierarchical self-assembly is ubiquitous in Nature. It forms the basic construction technique used for the self-assembly from small proteins to multicellular organisms. It remains, however, a great challenge to create artificial nanostructures that can rival the functionality of these natural systems.Within SURCONFOLD we address this challenge by developing a truly hierarchically approach that allows for full control over the two-dimensional spatial positioning of multiple different functional groups at a variety of interfaces with 0.5-20 nm spatial resolution. To this extend we will employ surface-confined foldamers, i.e. oligomeric molecules with tunable sequence and incorporated functionality that adsorb at the liquid-solid interface and fold into a well-defined conformation. These 2D-confined objects with defined shape will subsequently self-assemble into regular 2D patterns, and time- and space-resolved characterization will be employed to unravel the complex folding and self-assembly behavior. Control over the foldamers¿ chain sequence and 2D conformation will enable the precise spatial arrangement of various different chemical entities, which can be exploited for the precise spatial arrangement of functional groups such as donor-acceptor-type chromophores, catalytically active groups or recognition sites, leading to new opportunities for optoelectronic materials, catalysts, or sensors. Our approach thus involves several hierarchical organization levels to transfer information present at the molecular level in the form of a specific monomer sequence to the overall assembled, true hybrid material, and offers thereby an exquisite control over both chemical nature and spatial arrangement of surface functionalization. Therefore, SURCONFOLD will apply a cross-disciplinary approach involving organic, polymer, and physical chemists with complementary expertise to generate new knowledge in the burgeoning area of materials and nanoscience with potential impact in sensing, optoelectronics, andcatalysis.