A new hydrogelator, pyridinium bromide salt of N-6-bromohexanoyl-L-phenylamino octadecane, was synthesized. Supramolecular hydrogels can be formed through the self-assembly of this hydrogelator in water. In this work, D2O was used instead of H2O as solvent for FT-IR measurement due to the fact that it is impossible to obtain useful Fr-IR information on the hydrogen bonding in water. The investigation of PT-IR and steady-state fluorescence indicated that the driving forces for the self-assembly were mainly hydrogen bonding and hydrophobic interaction. Based on the data of XRD and molecular modeling, the possible mechanism of the formation of hydrogelator aggregates was proposed.
Xin Jian Fu Shu Qin Cao Ning Xia Wang Sheng Zu Zhang Hong wang Ya Jiang Yang
N-Octadecyl-N1-maleoyl-L-phenylalanine （ODMA-L-Phe） was synthesized through the condensation, deprotection and acid- ylation reaction of BOC-L-phenylalanine, octadecylamine and maleic anhydride. ODMA-L-Phe can self-assemble in some organic solvents and turned them into thermally reversible physical supramolecular organogels. The morphology of ODMA-L-Phe aggregates was characterized by polarized optical microscopy （POM） and field emission scanning electron microscope （FE-SEM）. The aggregates of ODMA-L-Phe were needle-like fibrils with diameters of approximately 100-200 nm. The mechanism of ODMA- L-Phe self-assembly in organic solvents was investigated using XH NMR and circular dichroism （CD）. The results indicated that hydrogen bonding was one of the main driving forces for the self-assembly of ODMA-L-Phe.
Sheng Zu Zhang Xin Jian Fu Hong Wang Ya Jiang Yang
