Self-Assembling Star Polymers

Significance

Polymers of well-defined structure continue to see application in material science, catalysis, and drug delivery. The authors demonstrate a hydrogen-bonding platform designed to self-assemble linear polymers into the more complex, higher molecular weight, star polymer architecture. The method appears to be applicable to a variety of polymer backbones and, more interestingly, the higher molecular weight assemblies have a lower polydispersity than their single chain progenitors.