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Pore‐Filled Nanoporous Silica Colloidal Films with Enantioselective Permeability
Author(s) -
Ignaciode Leon Patricia A.,
Cichelli Julie A.,
Abelow Alexis E.,
Zharov Ilya
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
zeitschrift für anorganische und allgemeine chemie
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.354
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1521-3749
pISSN - 0044-2313
DOI - 10.1002/zaac.201300408
Subject(s) - nanopore , nanoporous , monolayer , materials science , polymer , chemical engineering , colloid , enantiomer , polymerization , enantioselective synthesis , permeation , colloidal silica , polymer chemistry , nanotechnology , membrane , organic chemistry , chemistry , catalysis , composite material , coating , biochemistry , engineering
We prepared nanoporous silica colloidal films whose nanopores were filled with polymer brushes containing chiral selector moieties in the side chains, or with a chiral polypeptide. Both types of polymers were grown inside the nanopores using surface‐initiated polymerization and thus were covalently attached to the nanopore surface. We studied the enantioselective permeation in the resulting pore‐filled films and found that they possess a relatively high enantioselectivity. Increasing the number of chiral selectors inside the nanopores and preventing through solution diffusion by pore‐filling with polymers did not lead to increased enantioselectivity compared to that observed for silica colloidal films whose nanopores were surface‐modified with a monolayer of chiral selectors. This suggests that the enantioselectivity depends solely on the energy difference between the enantiomer/selector complexes and that through solution diffusion plays a minor role in the transport of enantiomers, which occurs predominantly through site hopping.