A research result on functional supramolecular polymer made by He Tian group in School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering was reported in Research Highlights of Nature, which is one of the top international academic journals.

    Covalent or noncovalent linked polymers with stimuli-responsive properties have been well researched as a kind of advanced functional materials. However, little effort has been devoted to establishing a bridge for switching between covalent polymers and noncovalent polymers. Actually, such unitive system is promising because it can combine their chemical advantages of two types of polymers in a single and tunable platform.

    Given this situation, Prof. He Tian (Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences ), associate professor Da-Hui Qu, PhD student Qiwei Zhang and their colleagues demonstrate a simple and effective way to construct a dual-modality supramolecular polymer, which can be switched between a noncovalent polymer and its corresponding covalent polymer in response to light stimuli by taking advantage of reversible photodimerization of coumarins and host−guest assemblies with γ-cyclodextrin (γ-CD). Moreover, this unique switchable polymer can also be employed to construct a dual-stimuli responsive supramolecular hydrogel with the surfactant cetyl trimethylammonium bromide (CTAB).

    In this system, the polymer is no longer simply belong to one of the two different classes of polymers (covalent or noncovalent), but can switched between them whenever you need. Just as written in Nature：”they combined two types of molecules.” This study presents a novel concept and may bring new and important light in the fields of supramolecular chemistry, polymer chemistry and material chemistry, etc.