PhD Student
Member of the GRK2516
Group: Prof. Pol Besenius, JGU Chemistry
Contact: E-mail, Web

Research Project Area B: Supramolecules – Experiments
Kinetically Controlled Supramolecular Polymerization of Porphyrin-based Peptide Amphiphiles

Porphyrin-based building blocks are ubiquitous in nature and display exceptional self-assembly behaviour of their artificial systems. Despite their strong tendency to aggregate due to π-stacking and solvophobic effects, porphyrin-based systems often assemble into different types of aggregates though competing pathways. Besides variations in the molecular structures, changes in solvent, temperature or pH often facilitate to multiple potential morphologies, which enables access to various techniques and the formation of special architectures.
In this work, porphyrin-based amphiphiles are used to create highly ordered supramolecular structures under kinetic control in water. The peripheral peptide sequences represent a versatile element that are used as a tool for the successful stimuli-responsive formation of smart biomaterials. Following the concept of pathway complexity, the kinetic control has the potential to produce different structures from the same starting material, which far exceeds the possibilities of purely thermodynamic controlled supramolecular polymers and will be further applied to the preparation of supramolecular (co)polymers at interfaces.

Fig.1 Schematic representaton of kinetically controlled 1D self-assembly of porphyrin-based peptide amphiphiles in water.