Multifunctional supramolecular hydrogels using nucleotides as elementary biomolecular building blocks: synthetic strategies and their potential applications

Abstract

Small naturally occurring biomolecules which are commonly available can be prudent small molecule hydrogelators for the formation of biocompatible and highly applicable hydrogels. Biomolecules with variable binding sites mediate the self-assembly processes owing to their π-π interactions, and H-bonding interactions. Amino acids, nucleobases and carbohydrates are the primary constituents of the building blocks of all the important complex biological macromolecules. The ability of the primitive building blocks especially nucleobase analogs to construct biologically and chemically significant molecular self-assemblies has formed the basis of soft hybrid hydrogels, leading to a wide range of fascinating applications. In this thesis, we have utilized nucleotides as an elementary small biomolecular hydrogelator for the formation of functional supramolecular hydrogels. Particularly, various self-assembled supramolecular hydrogel networks are developed based on non-covalent interactions of metal ions or small biogenic molecules with nucleotides. A detailed mechanistic insight towards the growth of the fibrillar network with promising multifunctional properties such as self-healing, self-supporting, injectable, stimuli-responsive, bio-mimicking, and ion-conducting abilities have been studied. Also, the self assembled supramolecular hydrogels have been exploited for promising applications including antimicrobial agents, for phase-separation techniques, as a drug-delivery vehicle, as a catalyst for organic transformation reactions, as an ion-conducting hydrogel for designing of electrochromic devices, and as enzyme mimic catalysts.