Calixarenes and cations: a time-lapse photography of the big-bang

The outstanding cation complexation properties emerging from the pioneering studies on calixarene ligands during a five-year period in the early 1980s triggered a big-bang burst of publications on such macrocycles that is still lasting at a distance of more than 30 years. A time-lapse photography of this timeframe is proposed which allows the readers to pinpoint the contributions of the different research groups.