Self-assembly of rodcoil molecules

Block copolymers and their low molar mass analogues, where a fraction of the backbone is rigid and the remainder has low torsional energies, are referred to as 'rodcoils' for obvious reasons. Various self-assembled structures formed by rodcoils have been observed over the past year, including aligned strips, nanostructures sometimes ordered in a supperlattice, and other microstructures with unusual zig-zag and arrowhead-shaped domains. Such nanostructures, varying in symmetry, could mimic folded proteins and form novel supramolecular materials in which the basic constituent is a discrete aggregate of rodcoil molecules.