Abstract

Tuning the properties of surfaces and functional polymeric systems is a key focus in materials science. One of the major scientific challenges is to achieve well-defined properties and structural order on the surface of materials in an efficient and selective fashion. A range of efficient reactions, some of which adhere to the criteria defined for Click chemistries, (e.g. copper catalyzed Huisgen [2+3] cycloadditions, (hetero) Diels-Alder (HDA) cycloadditions, etc.), fulfill the criterion of reaching (ideally) quantitative conversions, making them particularly attractive reaction classes for orthogonal surface design

The development of such reactions for orthogonal design has been a recent focus of the Macroarc group; in particular the development of RAFT-HDA. As well as acting as an (ultra) rapid conjugation technique, the (H)DA reaction sequence also has the advantage of containing a cycloadduct linkage that is completely reversible (via a retro-Diels-Alder (rDA) reaction) at elevated temperatures. Below are two examples of how the (H)DA/rDA chemistry has been applied to the design of novel structured materials and surfaces.