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“Synthesis of Chiral Small Molecules and Glycomimetics as Functional Molecular Gelators”

Chiral small molecules are important for the synthesis of medicinally relevant compounds and for the preparation of advanced materials. Carbohydrates are abundant and renewable natural resources. Sugars contain multiple chiral centers and can be selectively functionalized to produce interesting new materials or biologically active compounds. For the past several years, my group has been working on the synthesis of chiral heterocycles and natural product analogs and the design and synthesis of carbohydrate based advanced soft biomaterials. We have carried out the synthesis and characterizations of various monosaccharide derivatives and discovered several novel classes of sugar based low molecular weight gelators (LMWGs). These compounds form unique reversible supramolecular organogels and hydrogels that are useful in biomedical research and as advanced functional materials. In this seminar, I will give a brief overview of our ongoing research on synthesis of chiral small molecules and then focus on the synthesis and study of several D-glucose and D-glucosamine based molecular gelators.