Transducing chemical energy through catalysis by an artificial molecular motor.

Cells display a range of mechanical activities generated by motor proteins powered through catalysis. This raises the fundamental question of how the acceleration of a chemical reaction can enable the energy released from that reaction to be transduced (and, consequently, work to be done) by a molecular catalyst. Here we demonstrate the molecular-level transduction of chemical energy to mechanical force in the form of the powered contraction and powered re-expansion of a cross-linked polymer gel driven by the directional rotation of artificial catalysis-driven molecular motors.

Scalable Approach to Molecular Motor-Polymer Conjugates for Light-Driven Artificial Muscles.

The integration of molecular machines and motors into materials represents a promising avenue for creating dynamic and functional molecular systems, with potential applications in soft robotics or reconfigurable biomaterials. However, the development of truly scalable and controllable approaches for incorporating molecular motors into polymeric matrices has remained a challenge. Here, it is shown that light-driven molecular motors with sensitive photo-isomerizable double bonds can be converted into initiators for Cu-mediated controlled/living radical polymerization enabling the synthesis of star-shaped motor-polymer conjugates.

Out-of-Equilibrium Mechanical Disruption of β-Amyloid-Like Fibers using Light-Driven Molecular Motors.

Artificial molecular motors have the potential to generate mechanical work on their environment by producing autonomous unidirectional motions when supplied with a source of energy. However, the harnessing of this mechanical work to subsequently activate various endoenergetic processes that can be useful in materials science remains elusive. Here, it is shown that by integrating a light-driven rotary motor through hydrogen bonds in a β-amyloid-like structure forming supramolecular hydrogels, the mechanical work generated during the constant rotation of the molecular machine under UV irradiation is sufficient to disrupt the β-amyloid fibers and to trigger a gel-to-sol transition at macroscopic scale.

Daisy chain architectures: from discrete molecular entities to polymer materials.

Daisy chain architectures, made by the self-complementary threading of an axle covalently linked to a macrocycle, represent a particularly intriguing family of supramolecular and mechanically interlocked (macro)molecules. In this review, we discuss their recent history, their modular chemical structures, and the various synthetic strategies to access them. We also detail how their internal sliding motions can be controlled and how their integration within polymers can amplify that motions up to the macroscopic scale.

Thermodynamics, morphology and molecular structure of molecular compounds in trisamide triarylamine organogels and pseudo-organogels.

In this paper, potentially-gelling binary systems are investigated by DSC, X-ray and Electron microscopy in order to assess their gel status and the role of the Hansen solubility parameter. The low molecular weight organogelator is a Triarylamine Trisamide (TATA) while the solvents consist of a series of halogeno-ethanes and of toluene. Temperature-concentration phase diagrams are mapped out from DSC traces.