A pyridinium/anilinium [2]catenane that operates as an acid–base driven optical switch

• Sarah J. Vella and
• Stephen J. Loeb

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2018, 14, 1908–1916, doi:10.3762/bjoc.14.165

• DB24C8 ring resides solely at the bis(pyridinium)ethane site and changes to colorless when the crown ether is shuttling (i.e., circumrotating) back and forth between the two recognition sites thus optically signalling the onset of the shuttling dynamics. Keywords: catenane; mechanically interlocked

• molecule; molecular switch; Introduction [2]Rotaxane molecular shuttles [1][2][3][4][5] are the dynamic building blocks of a wide variety of molecular switches [6][7][8][9] and a number of sophisticated molecular machines that operate away from equilibrium [10][11][12][13][14][15]. We have previously

Synthesis of diamido-bridged bis-pillar[5]arenes and tris-pillar[5]arenes for construction of unique [1]rotaxanes and bis-[1]rotaxanes

• Ying Han,
• Li-Ming Xu,
• Cui-Yun Nie,
• Shuo Jiang,
• Jing Sun and
• Chao-Guo Yan

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2018, 14, 1660–1667, doi:10.3762/bjoc.14.142

• ]arene di(oxybutoxy)benzoic acid with monoamido-functionalized pillar[5]arenes resulted in the diamido-bridged tris-pillar[5]arenes, which successfully form the unique bis-[1]rotaxanes bearing longer than diaminopropylene diamido bridges. Keywords: bis-[1]rotaxane; mechanically interlocked molecule