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Updated: Oct 25, 2026

Synthesis of Cyclic Polymers and Characterization of Their Diffusive Motion in the Melt State at the Single Molecule Level
Published on: September 26, 2016
Solid-vapor synthesis of dynamic crystalline one-dimensional supramolecular polymers from amorphous macrocycles
Qian Yang1, Zhen Sun1, Linnan Zhang1
1State Key Laboratory of Coordination Chemistry, Key Laboratory of Mesoscopic Chemistry of MOE, Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Advanced Organic Materials, School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Nanjing University, Nanjing, PR China.
Abstract:
Crystalline supramolecular polymers (CSPs), unlike conventional supramolecular polymers in soft-matter phases, possess ordered polymeric structures for establishing structure-function relationships. However, most reported CSPs lack the dynamic and responsive characteristics intrinsic to supramolecular polymers due to their dense molecular packing. Herein, we report a highly dynamic CSP (CSP-1) via a unique solid-vapor host-guest-driven synthetic strategy, which integrates solid-vapor host-guest-driven condensation, host-guest-driven supramolecular polymerization, and crystallization of polymeric chains into a single step. The polymeric chains in CSP-1 can exist both in the crystalline state and after dissolution in non-competitive solvents. Additionally, CSP-1 exhibits remarkable multi-responsiveness to physical and chemical stimuli, enabling reversible in situ transformations between CSP-1 and various non-polymeric crystalline structures. In contrast to the heat-induced depolymerization typically observed in soft-matter supramolecular polymers, heating enables disassembled macrocycle monomers to reassemble into the thermodynamically stable CSP-1, resembling an annealing process in conventional polymers.
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