Sequence Information Transfer in Oligoarylacetylenes

The ability of genetic biopolymers to store and transfer information provides the mechanism for the evolution of function from a population of sequences. Synthetic polymers with the ability to transmit information are exceedingly rare. This work demonstrates template-directed information transfer in oligoarylacetylene trimers that use reversible covalent bonds to form base pairing interactions. Information was encoded as a sequence of aniline and benzaldehyde subunits linked together by a diethynylbenzene backbone. Trimers formed sequence-specific, imine-linked monomer-template complexes, which could be oligomerized using palladium mediated Sonogashira coupling to generate daughter trimers with complementary sequences.