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Updated: Aug 5, 2026

Self-assembling Morphologies Obtained from Helical Polycarbodiimide Copolymers and Their Triazole Derivatives
Published on: February 7, 2017
Bifacial ladder polymers enabled by chirality-assisted synthesis that exhibit self-assembly and chirality-induced
Fumitaka Ishiwari1,2,3,4, Kazuharu Murotani5, Akinori Saeki6,7
1Department of Applied Chemistry, Graduate School of Engineering, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan. ishiwari@chem.eng.osaka-u.ac.jp.
None:
The development of structural concepts in polymers has repeatedly enabled advances in molecular organization and emergent functions. Here we introduce "bifacial ladder polymers" -rigid double-stranded backbones bearing two deliberately differentiated molecular faces- realized through a chirality-assisted synthetic strategy. To implement this architecture, we designed a C2-chiral 2,8-dibromoindenofluorene monomer bearing two different substituents with syn stereochemistry across the sp3-carbon pair, such that only one ladderization geometry is accessible. Polymerization of the enantiopure monomers with a diboronate comonomer under Suzuki-Miyaura conditions affords precursor polymers, which undergo regioselective ladderization to yield well-defined bifacial ladder polymers with fully preserved facial differentiation. The homochiral bifacial ladder polymers display emergent chiroptical behaviour in the solid state: thin films form one-handed supramolecular helices with circular dichroism intensities over 100-fold stronger than those of their monomeric or non-ladder analogues. Strikingly, these films also exhibit robust chirality-induced spin selectivity, with spin-polarization values exceeding ±90% and opposite signs for the two enantiomers, far surpassing their precursor polymers. These results demonstrate that bifacial ladder polymers provide a versatile platform for emergent self-assemblies and functions in organic polymeric materials.
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