(273a) Multiscale Self-Assembly of Chiral Nanocylinder Superstructures from Precise Liquid Crystalline Oligomers

Liquid crystalline materials are typically synthesized with molecular-scale precision at the small-molecule scale, but feature increasing dispersity at larger length scales, which impacts their self-assembly. Here, we synthesize a series of precise, sequence-defined liquid crystalline oligomers. Remarkably, these oligomers undergo liquid crystalline-mediated assembly into fibrillar morphologies; freeze-fracture SEM reveals these to be high-aspect-ratio nanocylinders. These nanocylinders then assemble into chiral domains: a combination of molecular design, thermal conditions, and boundary conditions determine the layout and packing of cylinders within these chiral domains. We are exploring the use of these materials for templates, for optical materials, and for exploring the fundamentals of chirality transfer across length scales.