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Supramolecular Liquid Crystals Based on Cyclodextrins

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Part of the book series: Environmental Chemistry for a Sustainable World ((ECSW,volume 17))

Abstract

Cyclodextrin-based materials represent an environmentally friendly alternative to toxic liquid crystalline materials. Cyclodextrins are well-known for their cavity and inclusion properties. They are scaffold molecules that can be chemically modified to obtain functional materials for various applications. For instance, amphiphilic cyclodextrins have attracted tremendous interests from researchers of different fields because of their ability to self-assemble and to encapsulate medicines. They can also be designed to form supramolecular liquid crystals. Since the first report of a class of 6-alkylthiolated β-cyclodextrin derivatives that exhibit thermotropic liquid crystalline properties in 1993, there has been only few developments in this area. But there is an increasing interest to develop cyclodextrin-based liquid crystalline materials, owing to their potential utilities in different areas.

In this chapter, we review cyclodextrins-based molecular designs, their synthesis, as well as characterization of their thermotropic and lyotropic liquid crystalline properties. The presence of numerous hydroxyl groups and a face-to-face pseudo-symmetry in native cyclodextrins create numerous opportunities for the design of smart materials. It has been shown that not only the nature of the substituent, but also its location highly influences the self-assembly behavior of the cyclodextrin derivatives. After an introduction on cyclodextrins and liquid crystals, we summarize various approaches used to chemically modify cyclodextrins for the development of thermotropic and lyotropic liquid crystals, such as generating amphiphilic derivatives, or appending mesogenic groups to both monomeric and polymeric cyclodextrin backbones. The last section presents examples of applications of cyclodexrin-based liquid crystals for bio-sensing and liquid crystal displays.

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Acknowledgements

The financial support from Alberta Innovates – Technology Futures, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and the University of Calgary are greatly acknowledged.

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Correspondence to Chang-Chun Ling .

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© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature

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Champagne, PL., Kumar, R., Ling, CC. (2018). Supramolecular Liquid Crystals Based on Cyclodextrins. In: Fourmentin, S., Crini, G., Lichtfouse, E. (eds) Cyclodextrin Applications in Medicine, Food, Environment and Liquid Crystals. Environmental Chemistry for a Sustainable World, vol 17. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76162-6_7

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