Fluorescent bowl-shaped nanoparticles from ‘clicked’ porphyrin–polymer conjugates

Abstract

We report the synthesis and post-synthetic modification of a library of hydrophilic and hydrophobic ‘clicked’ triazole-linked porphyrin–polymer conjugates (PPCs), and their subsequent assembly into fluorescent bowl-shaped nanoparticles.

Homopolymer nanobowls with a controlled size and denting degree

“…Nanobowls are nanospheres with a single dent, and are often dubbed as dimpled beads and dented nanospheres when the dent is rather small. 1,2 They have shown more intriguing prospects than simple hollow nanostructures in a broad range of research fields, such as energy storage, surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS), photonics, catalysis, nanomotors, and drug delivery, and so forth. 3–6 Current methods for synthesizing polymer-based nanobowls are dominated by the template technique, the main disadvantages of which are time consumption and environmental contamination.…”

Aggregation behavior of tetraphenylporphyrin in aqueous surfactant solutions: Chiral premicellar J-aggregate formation

“…Among the above mentioned supramolecular assemblies highly ordered edge-to-edge J-aggregates and related porphyrin-based hybrid ionic associates possess perhaps the most useful photophysical properties [7,8]. The latter can be easily obtained as a result of the interaction between the charged porphyrin molecules and the oppositely charged polyelectrolytes [9][10][11][12][13] or ionic surfactants [14][15][16][17][18], leading to the macrocycle charge neutralization accompanied by their self-assembly into regular ladder-type J-aggregates. Similar processes have been studied in details for a number of water-soluble meso-substituted 5,10,15,20-tetraphenylporphyrin (TPP) derivatives [19][20][21], as well as for a single hydrophobic porphyrin in a neutral premicellar anionic surfactant solution [22].…”

Retaining individualities: the photodynamics of self-ordering porphyrin assemblies

“…These porphyrinpolymer conjugates were utilised in a range of applications such as photodynamic therapy (PDT), [22][23][24] cell-imaging, 25,26 initiators for complex polymers 27 and simple proof-of-concept experiments for potential self-assembly methodologies. 28,29 However, the only excited state dynamics studies performed involved long time scales (4nanoseconds), as the majority of the systems were oriented towards PDT applications. 30,31 However, ultrafast dynamics of chromophores is a determinant of light energy harvesting efficiency.…”