Abstract
Helical structural motifs attract great interest because they can be used as a constituent unit for memory, sensor, and display devices on the basis of their helical molecular shape. Zinc bilindione is a helical molecule, which undergoes racemization between P and M conformers in solution. In this system, coordination of a chiral guest to the zinc can induce helical chirality due to the shift in the P-M equilibrium. In zinc bilindione dimer system, binding of the chiral guest to one subunit induces its helical chirality and then this conformational change can allosterically control the helical chirality of the other unit through intramolecular interactions. One would expect that zinc bilindione is aggregated, the helical chirality induced by a small amount of guest can control the helical chirality of whole molecular aggregate. To realize such chiral amplification system, we prepared the zinc bilindione complex having long alkyl chains and examined its mesomorphic properties.
