Macrocyclic urea/amide hybrids are introduced as functional, anion-selective membrane transporters in lipid bilayer membranes. Six derivatives with varying side chains (aliphatic and aromatic) and conformations (parallel and antiparallel carbonyl dipoles) are investigated by fluorescence methods, among which the more active aromatic derivatives were selected for an in-depth study. Strong response of transport activity toward anion exchange and weak response toward cation exchange establish anion selectivity for all macrocycles. "Antiparallel" macrocycles that self-assemble into "antiparallel" nanotubes without macrodipole exhibit Hofmeister selectivity. Parallel macrocycles that self-assemble into parallel nanotubes with strong macrodipole are capable of overcoming the dehydration penalty of the Hofmeister bias. Both systems show additional chloride selectivity. The activity of antiparallel and parallel nanotubes in binary mixtures of bromide/perchlorate and chloride/thiocyanate is over- and underadditive, respectively (positive and negative AMFE). The activity of antiparallel nanotubes decreases rapidly with increasing membrane polarization, whereas parallel nanotubes are inactivated at high and activated by membrane potentials at low concentration. Hill coefficients of parallel nanotubes decrease significantly with membrane polarization, whereas those of antiparallel nanotubes increase slightly. The overall unusual characteristics of parallel nanotubes call for a new transport mechanism, where macrodipole-potential interactions account for voltage sensitivity and anion-macrodipole interactions account for anion selectivity.

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Folding and self-assembly of biomacromolecules has inspired the development of discrete, non-natural oligomers that fold and/or self-assemble in a controlled manner. Though aromatic and aliphatic oligoamides remain unmatched for structural diversity and synthetic versatility, oligomers based on amide bond surrogates, such as urea backbones, also demonstrated a propensity for folding and self-assembly. In this Perspective, we review the advances in the design of oligomeric aromatic and aliphatic urea sequences (essentially N,N'-linked) that fold and/or self-assemble. Whenever applicable, the relationship between structure and function will be highlighted.

Substantial progress has been made toward the development of metal-free catalysts of enantioselective transformations, yet the discovery of organic catalysts effective at low catalyst loadings remains a major challenge. Here we report a novel synergistic catalyst combination system consisting of a peptide-inspired chiral helical (thio)urea oligomer and a simple tertiary amine that is able to promote the Michael reaction between enolizable carbonyl compounds and nitroolefins with excellent enantioselectivities at exceptionally low (1/10 000) chiral catalyst/substrate molar ratios. In addition to high selectivity, which correlates strongly with helix folding, the system we report here is also highly amenable to optimization, as each of its components can be fine-tuned separately to increase reaction rates and/or selectivities. The predictability of the foldamer secondary structure coupled to the high level of control over the primary sequence results in a system with significant potential for future catalyst design.

Caught in a fold: A simple and efficient coupling strategy to make aliphatic oligourea foldamers is reported. Crystal structures show that the pyrrolidine units (red; see picture) do not impair the 2.5‐helical folding of the oligoureas. This modular strategy enables assembly of long helical segments containing non‐adjacent pyrrolidine units as exemplified by the synthesis of a helix that is approximately 40 Å long.

One fold to rule them all: New heterogeneous aliphatic backbone foldamers belonging to the γ‐peptide superfamily and containing various combinations of urea/amide (U/A) and urea/carbamate (U/C) units are reported. Structural studies at atomic resolution reveal hydrogen‐bonded helical structures akin to that formed by cognate Un homooligomers.

Oligoarginine and guanidinium-rich molecular transporters have been shown to facilitate the intracellular delivery of a diverse range of biologically relevant cargos. Several such transporters have been suggested to interact with cell surface heparan sulfate proteoglycans as part of their cell entry pathway. Unlike other guanidinium-rich transporters, the cellular uptake of guanidinoglycosides at nanomolar concentrations is exclusively heparan sulfate dependent. As distinct cells differ in their expression levels and/or composition of cell-surface heparan sulfate proteoglycans, one may be able to exploit such differences to selectively target certain cell types. To systematically investigate the nature of their cell surface interactions, monomeric and dimeric guanidinoglycosides were synthesized using neomycin, paromomycin, and tobramycin as scaffolds. These transporters differ in the number and 3-dimensional arrangement of guanidinium groups. Their cellular uptake was measured by flow cytometry in wild type and mutant Chinese hamster ovary cells after generating the corresponding fluorescent streptavidin-phycoerythrinCy5 conjugates. All derivatives showed negligible uptake in mutant cells lacking heparan sulfate. Decreasing the number of guanidinium groups diminished uptake, but the three dimensional arrangement of these groups was less important for cellular delivery. Whereas conjugates prepared with the monomeric carriers showed significantly reduced uptake in mutant cells expressing heparan sulfate chains with altered patterns of sulfation, conjugates prepared with the dimeric guanidinoglycosides could overcome this deficiency and maintain high levels of uptake in such deficient cells. This finding suggests that cellular uptake depends on the valency of the transporter and both the content and arrangement of the sulfate groups on the cell surface receptors. Competition studies with chemically desulfated or carboxy-reduced heparin derivatives corroborated these observations. Taken together, these findings show that increasing the valency of the transporters retains heparan sulfate specificity and provides reagents that could distinguish different cell types based on the specific composition of their cell surface heparan sulfate proteoglycans.

In the search of molecules that could recognize sizeable areas of protein surfaces, a series of ten helical aromatic oligoamide foldamers was synthesized on solid phase. The foldamers comprise three to five monomers carrying various proteinogenic side chains, and exist as racemic mixtures of interconverting right-handed and left-handed helices. Functionalization of the foldamers by a nanomolar ligand of human carbonic anhydrase II (HCA) ensured that they would be held in close proximity to the protein surface. Foldamer-protein interactions were screened by circular dichroism (CD). One foldamer displayed intense CD bands indicating that a preferred helix handedness is induced upon interacting with the protein surface. The crystal structure of the complex between this foldamer and HCA could be resolved at 2.1 Å resolution and revealed a number of unanticipated protein-foldamer, foldamer-foldamer, and protein-protein interactions.