Chemistry beyond the molecules

Analytical chemistry having an interdisciplinary character cannot set aside the attractive power and advances of supramolecular chemistry - the chemistry beyond the molecule or the chemistry of molecular assemblies and of intermolecular bonds as defined by Jean-Marie Lehn, who won the Nobel Prize in 1987. Recognition, reactivity, and transport, as well as self-assembly, self-organization and self-replication are the basic functional features of supramolecular species and chemistry. 

Since 1982 there have been enormous developments in metal-based chemistry, particularly the emergence of supramolecular chemistry - chemistry beyond the molecule, molecular architecture, and molecular engineering. Comprehensive Supramolecular Chemistry was published in 1996, a survey which contains much of interest to coordination chemists. Consequently in this volume review material relating to supramolecular systems is mainly restricted to developments since 1990. 

It has since then been reformulated on various occasions, e.g., Supramolecular chemistry may be defined as chemistry beyond the molecule , bearing on the organized entities of higher complexity that result from the association of two or more chemical species held together by intermolecular forces [1.7]. 

Supramolecular chemistry has been defined by one of its leading proponents, Jean-Marie Lehn, who won the Nobel Prize for his work in the area in 1987, as the chemistry of molecular assemblies and of the intermolecular bond . More colloquially this may be expressed as chemistry beyond the molecule . Other definitions include phrases such as the chemistry of the non-covalent bond and non-molecular chemistry . Originally supramolecular chemistry was defined in terms of the non-covalent interaction between a host and a guest molecule as highlighted in Figure 1.1, which illustrates the relationship between molecular and supramolecular chemistry in terms of both structures and function. 

In keeping with the basic tenet of supramolecular chemistry, that it is chemistry beyond the molecule , any therapy that claims to work through a supramolecular mechanism must involve multiple target specific interactions. Furthermore the nature of the interactions should be non-covalent. 

Supramolecular chemistry is chemistry beyond the molecule. It requires the simultaneous, precise control during synthesis of chemical composition, physical properties, and morphology over considerable length scales. An important component is self-assembly, the buildup of molecular structures... 

Chemistry beyond the molecule [2], or supramolecular chemistry as we know it, has evolved over the past three decades, and has now become a hot area of research in chemistry. One of the characteristics of supramolecular chemistry is that the traditional barriers of organic, inorganic, physical and analytical chemistry do not exist here - it is a unique multidisciplinary area in which all areas of chemistry (and some other disciplines) are blended nicely. 

Supramolecular chemistry, or chemistry beyond the molecule, has provided a wide canvas for a variety of studies of molecular materials in the solid state. The most orderly manifestations of the solid state are single crystals, and the earlier volume in this series with the present Editor, The Crystal as a Supramolecular Entity, sought to establish that the crystal is the perfect example of a supramolecular assembly, justifying as it were the earlier statements of Dunitz and Lehn in this regard. 

As defined by Lehn, ° Supramolecular chemistry, the chemistry beyond the molecule, is the designed chemistry of the intermolecular bond, just as molecular chemistry is that of the covalent bond. It is a highly interdisciplinary field of science covering the chemical, physical, and biological features of chemical species held together and organized by means of intermolecular (noncovalent) binding interactions . 

Supramolecular chemistry is often thought of as chemistry beyond the molecule ... 

---