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Construction of Light‐Harvesting Polymeric Vesicles in Aqueous Solution with Spatially Separated Donors and Acceptors
Author(s) -
Li Huimei,
Liu Yannan,
Huang Tong,
Qi Meiwei,
Ni Yunzhou,
Wang Jie,
Zheng Yongli,
Zhou Yongfeng,
Yan Deyue
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
macromolecular rapid communications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.348
H-Index - 154
eISSN - 1521-3927
pISSN - 1022-1336
DOI - 10.1002/marc.201600818
Subject(s) - vesicle , aqueous solution , polymer chemistry , chemistry , polymer science , chemical engineering , materials science , nanotechnology , membrane , organic chemistry , engineering , biochemistry
This communication describes polymer vesicles self‐assembled from hyperbranched polymers (branched polymersomes (BPs)) as scaffolds, conceptually mimicking the natural light‐harvesting system in aqueous solution. The system is constructed with hydrophobic 4‐chloro‐7‐nitro‐2,1,3‐benzoxadiazole (NBD‐Cl) as donors encapsulated in the hydrophobic hyperbranched cores of the vesicles and the hydrophilic Rhodamine B (RB) as acceptors incorporated on the surface of the vesicles through the cyclodextrin (CD)/RB host–guest interactions, through which the donors and acceptors are spatially separated to effectively avoid the self‐quenching between donors. This vesicular light harvesting system has presented good energy transfer efficiency of about 80% in water, and can be used as the ink to write multiclolor letters. In addition, due to the giant dimension of BPs, the real‐time fluorescent images of the vesicles under an optical microscope can be observed to prove the light‐harvesting process. It is supposed that such a vesicular light‐harvesting antenna can be used to construct artificial photosynthesis systems in the future.