Organic Dendrimers

Nonetheless, it was a fairly short step from octopus compounds to dendrimers, and the step was taken by Vogtle in the late 1970s when he attempted to use a cascade reaction to prepare a molecule of the dendrimer type that would now be considered a dendron rather than a fully developed dendrimer. It began with the addition of acrylonitrile to an anfine, followed by reduction of the nitrile to amine. This was followed by a further reaction with acrylonitrile, and the process was repeated several times to yield highly branched macromolecules. There were initially problems with the reduction step but these were overcome, and the preparation of these poly(propylene imine) dendrimers was later commercialized. 

The sequential growth and branching involved in the preparation of dendrimers had been considered by Flory many years before they were actually prepared. Flory developed a sound understanding of the kind of processes that would occur in the self-polymerization of a molecule of the type ABj most of which have been shown to be correct by the relatively recent experimental studies. In particular, the existence of a limit to growth was predicted. This limit has become known as the starburst limit, and is the reason for the highly monodisperse nature of fully developed dendrimers. 

The starburst point occurs at a well-defined limit for each dendrimer system, and its occurrence is dependent mainly on (a) the functionality of the core, (b) the multiplicity of the branches and (c) the branch length. However, the volume of the core itself, and the length of the monomer branches also have an influence. The end groups may occupy the outer surface of the dendrimer, or the branches may fold inwards, thus distributing the end-groups within the dendrimer. The factors that control this behaviour of the branches are not fully understood, but include the nature of the solvent and the detailed chemistry of the dendrimer branches. 

The properties of the various PAMAM dendrimer precursors are shown in Table 9.1. 

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Dendrimers can be fabricated so that they have a hydrophobic interior and a hydrophilic periphery. Indeed, organic dendrimers, with relatively non-polar... 

Similarly, Pd, Ag, and Pd-Ag nanoclusters on alumina have been prepared by the polyol method [230]. Dend-rimer encapsulated metal nanoclusters can be obtained by the thermal degradation of the organic dendrimers [368]. If salts of different metals are reduced one after the other in the presence of a support, core-shell type metallic particles are produced. In this case the presence of the support is vital for the success of the preparation. For example, the stepwise reduction of Cu and Pt salts in the presence of a conductive carbon support (Vulcan XC 72) generates copper nanoparticles (6-8 nm) that are coated with smaller particles of Pt (1-2 nm). This system has been found to be a powerful electrocatalyst which exhibits improved CO tolerance combined with high electrocatalytic efficiency. For details see Section 3.7 [53,369]. 

Supported, intact DENs do not bind CO and are not active catalysts. Presumably, in the absence of solvent, the dendrimer collapses onto the nanoparticles preventing even small substrates from accessing the metal surface (11,12). This means that the organic dendrimer must be removed in order to prepare active catalysts. 

Although the first publication on dendrimers appeared in 1978 [ 1 ] it is only in 1990 that the first report on phosphorus-containing dendrimers was published [2] i.e. after numerous papers devoted to the synthesis of organic dendrimers and practically at the same time than the description of a silicon containing dendrimer. 

Guo M, Vamavski O, Narayanan A et al (2009) Investigations of energy migration in an organic dendrimer macromolecule for sensory signal amplification. J Phys Chem A... 

The most common functional templates are those of simple amino compounds 4, amino acids 5, and dipeptides 8 (Scheme 3). The simplest amino templates, the tris(ethylene amine) ammonia types 6, 7, and 9 first used in organic dendrimers, have only just begun to be applied in forming peptide dendrimers. Constrained and usual amino acids and heterocyclic compounds such as porphyrin 13, have also been reported.1691... 

Infrared spectroscopy of adsorbed CO is a useful characterization tool for dendrimer-templated supported nanoparticles, because it directly probes particle surface features. In these experiments, which are performed in a standard infrared spectrometer using an in-situ transmission or DRIFTS cell, a sample of supported DENs is first treated to remove the organic dendrimer. Samples are often reduced under H2 at elevated temperature, flushed with He, and cooled to room temperature. Dosing with CO followed by flushing to remove the gas-phase CO allows for the spectrum of surface-bound CO to be collected and evaluated. Because adsorbed CO stretching frequencies are sensitive to surface geometric and electronic effects, it is potentially possible to evaluate the relative effects of each on nanoparticle properties. 

II. Intrinsic Photochemical and Photophysical Properties of Organic Dendrimers... 

Organic dendrimers are constituted by molecular components that can absorb light and, often, undergo Imninescence. It is therefore worthwhile recalling some fundamental aspects of the processes that follow light excitation of an organic molecule and then the complications that may arise because of the interactions among nearby molecular components. 

Most of these works are concerned with organic dendrimers a few are devoted to main group element-containing dendrimers. Among the latter silicon and phosphorus-containing dendrimers occupied a place of choice because of the rich diversity of their chemistry. 

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