Four novel unsymmetric piperazinyl polyazacyclophane scaffolds 1-4 were synthesized in high yields by an efficient cyclization strategy. Twenty-six libraries 12-37 (total 16000 compounds) were generated by a solution-phase combinatorial approach from 1-4 and thirty-eight functional groups. Potent antibacterial and HIV-1 tat/TAR protein-RNA disrupting activities were discovered. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.