Construction of Supramolecular Chirality in Polymer Systems: Chiral Induction, Transfer and Application

Chirality, commonly found in organisms, biomolecules and nature such as L-amino acids and D-sugars, has been extensively studied in chemistry and biomedical science. Hence, the demand for simple and efficient construction of chiral structures, especially chiral polymers, has been rapidly growing due to their potential applications in chemosensors, asymmetric catalysis and biological materials. However, most chiral polymers reported are prepared directly from chiral monomers/chiral catalysts, the corresponding strategies usually involve tedious and expensive design and synthesis. Fortunately, chirality induction strategies (such as circularly polarized light, chiral solvation and chiral gelation etc.) have been known to be highly versatile and efficient in producing chirality from achiral polymers. In this feature article, the current research on chirality induction, transfer and application in achiral polymer systems is summarized. Furthermore, this article discusses some basic concepts, seminal studies, recent advances, the structural design principles, as well as perspectives in the construction and applications of chiral polymers derived from achiral monomers, with the hope to attract more interest from researchers and further advance the development of chiral chemistry.