Maity A, Dey A, Si MK, Ganguly B, Das A. Impact of "half-crown/two carbonyl"-Ca
2+ metal ion interactions of a low molecular weight gelator (LMWG) on its fiber to nanosphere morphology transformation with a gel-to-sol phase transition.
SOFT MATTER 2018;
14:5821-5831. [PMID:
29972192 DOI:
10.1039/c8sm01071d]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/08/2023]
Abstract
We report here a smart functional low molecular weight gelator (LMWG) L, containing an unusual metal ion coordination site, i.e. "half-crown/two carbonyl". The gelator L shows excellent gelation behavior with typical fibrillar morphology in acetonitrile, methanol and ethanol media. Upon Ca2+ ion binding with its "half-crown/two carbonyl" coordination site, the acetonitrile gel of L exhibits a fiber to nanosphere morphology transformation along with a gel-to-sol phase transition as confirmed by microscopic investigation and by direct naked eye visualization, respectively. The mechanism involved in this morphology transformation and gel-to-sol phase transition process was studied thoroughly with the help of computational calculations and various spectroscopic experiments and discussed.
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