Exploiting donor-acceptor interactions in aqueous dynamic combinatorial libraries: exploratory studies of simple systems

The behaviour of aqueous dynamic combinatorial libraries (DCLs) containing either electron-rich donor building blocks based on dioxynaphthalene (DN), or electron-deficient acceptor building blocks based on naphthalenediimide (NDI) are described. The influence of concentration and ionic strength on library distribution and diversity, together with the responses to electronically-complementary templates have been explored in detail, establishing the principles to be employed in more complex libraries leading to a new generation of catenanes.