IUCr bursary case study: custom-designed supramolecular materials

In 2016 alone, the IUCr sponsored 40 international meetings and schools. One recent recipient of an IUCr Young Scientist Award describes the importance of these grants to their research and experience.

Custom-designed supramolecular assemblies have been an area of intense research because of their potential applications in a wide range of disciplines within the chemical and material sciences. Substantial progress has been made from the exploration of a range of heterotopic chelating ligand species, due to their favourable metal-binding properties and modular syntheses. The polypyridine family of ligands is often exploited in coordination chemistry due to their coordination behaviour, and the favourable electronic and magnetic properties of the resulting complexes. These complexes have found applications in dye-sensitized solar cells, redox photocatalysts, molecular magnetism and spin-crossover devices. My project involves the development of unsymmetrically substituted 2,2´-bipyridine scaffolds and incorporation into coordination polymers  and supramolecular materials and the investigation of their structural, photophysical and mechanical properties as well as the self-recognition processes governing their formation. The knowledge obtained from single-crystal X-ray data will allow an understanding of the coordination environment of these systems which will then be applied in the design and engineering of metallosupramolecular assemblies. In addition, the aim will be to use this functionalised bipyridine motif to generate tripodal systems with a view to forming supramolecular materials such as amorphous polymers or gels.

The IUCr bursary allowed me to travel to the BCA/CCG Intensive Teaching School in X-ray Structure Analysis in Durham. The school, where you have professors and lecturers at your disposal, provided invaluable knowledge in the mathematics, physics and chemistry which underpin X-ray diffraction as a technique. Through lectures, tutorials as well as interactive learning the intensive school covered each aspect and allowed me to gain an understanding to progress and apply this learning in a practical way moving forward in my career. As well as the content it delivered, it also gave me the opportunity to meet other students, post-docs and academics in the same field. The hospitality was incredible and everything from the accommodation to the food was fantastic.