The design of artificial receptors for complexation and controlled aggregation

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Abstract
Simple synthetic receptors have been developed that function via directed hydrogen bonding interactions in highly competitive solvents. Strong binding of this type in polar solvents may be due to a number of factors including favourable secondary hydrogen bonding interactions between the carboxylate and urea, the use of charged H-bond acceptors, an inefficient solvation of the closely spaced H-bond donor sites in the urea, and an entropically favourable release of solvent and/or counterion molecules on complex formation. We also demonstrate that these types of interactions can be used to induce, both in solution and the solid state, discrete 2 + 2 aggregates stabilized by a network of hydrogen bonds.