The formation of chiral supramolecular assemblies is an important aspect in the development of novel types of materials. DNA is well known to serve as a template for the organization of functional molecules. Among the many types of compounds investigated, cationic porphyrins take a prominent place. A wide variety of ligand-DNA complexes have been described, however, changes in the DNA template are limited.
We found that oligopyrenotides can serve as a chiral nanoscale template for the assembly of cationic porphyrins. Oligopyrenotides represent valuable alternatives to DNA scaffolds with substantially different electronic properties.

This work was carried out in the group of Prof. Robert Häner.

References:

• A. L. Nussbaumer, D. Studer, V. L. Malinovskii, R. Häner;
  "Amplification of Chirality by Supramolecular Polymerization of Pyrene Oligomers"
  Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 50, 5490-5494, (2011); doi:10.1002/anie.201100677.
• V. L. Malinovskii, A. L. Nussbaumer, R. Häner;
  "Oligopyrenotides: Chiral Nanoscale Templates for Chromophore Assembly"
  Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 51, 4905-4908, (2012); doi:10.1002/anie.201201352.