Routes to Functional Vesicle Membranes without Proteins

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Abstract
Fixation of reaction partners at appropriate distances from one another is a structural prerequisite for vectorial reactions and reaction sequences. In biological systems (e.g. the photosynthetically active thylakoid membrane or membrane receptors) the positions of the reaction centers are fixed by membrane‐protein complexes, but little is known about the structure of these complexes. Ordered reactive systems in synthetic vesicle membranes were first obtained by employing amphiphiles with reactive head groups as building units, by regioselective incorporation of foreign molecules into the membrane, by alignment of bolaamphiphiles with two head groups of differing solubility or size, and by the formation of domains. Chiral superstructures have also been observed in membranes, and the first stereoselective reactions have been performed in vesicle membranes. The report concludes with a brief discussion of membranes constructed from non‐amphiphilic building blocks and problems which still have to be solved.