title: Easily Accessible Thermotropic Hydrogen-Bonded Columnar Discotic Liquid Crystals from Fatty Acid- Tris-Benzoimidazolyl Benzene Complexes.
abstract: We report the formation of easily accessible hydrogen-bonded columnar discotic liquid crystals (LCs) based on tris-benzoimidazolyl benzene (TBIB) and commercially available fatty acids. By increasing the length of the fatty acid, the temperature range of liquid crystallinity was tuned. Introducing double bonds in octadecanoic acid lowered the crystallization temperature and increased the temperature range of the mesophase. Surprisingly, dimerized linoleic acid also forms an LC phase. When using branched aliphatic acids with the branching point close to the acid moiety, the mesophase was lost, whereas phosphonic acid or benzenesulfonic acid derivatives did have a mesophase, showing that the generality of this approach extends beyond carboxylic acids as the hydrogen-bond donor. Furthermore, a polymerizable LC phase was obtained from mixtures ofTBIBwith a methacrylate-bearing fatty acid, providing an approach for the fabrication of nanoporous polymer films if the methacrylate groups are polymerized. Finally, the higher solubility of methyl-TBIBwas used to suppress phase separation in stoichiometric mixtures of the template molecule with fatty acids.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Macromolecular and Organic Chemistry and the Institute for Complex Molecular Systems Eindhoven University of Technology P. O. Box 513 5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Jody A M
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-4048-9712
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Lugger
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Macromolecular and Organic Chemistry and the Institute for Complex Molecular Systems Eindhoven University of Technology P. O. Box 513 5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Rint P
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-8975-636X
authors.initials: RP
authors.lastname: Sijbesma
keywords: columnar discotic liquid crystals; fatty acids; hydrogen bonding; self-assembly; template synthesis