Planar rings in nano-Saturns and related complexes

Abstract

Nano-Saturn complexes with a planar horizontal ring can be constructed by selective nitrogen substitution into the ortho-positions in polyaryl macrocycles. A number of intriguing supermolecular complexes can be created with these planar or ribbon macrocycles, including nano-Saturns with a flat ring, nano-Saturns with an encircling belt, and nanotubes encircled by belts or rings. These systems are investigated using DFT (B3LYP-D3/6-31G(d)), which predicts their structures and finds them to have significant binding enthalpies.