The Org. Chem. Front. journal features on its front cover of the August 2026 issue the research article “A modular family of chiral cavitand receptors: tuning the chiroptical response of achiral fullerene guests” by Hugo Marchi, Athul Santha Bhaskaran, Cristian Montiel-Andreotti, Eva Prat-Font, Fiza Fariha, Pere Galán-Masferrer, Prof. Marcel Swart and Dr. Agustí Lledó. A new family of chiral self-folding cavitand receptors based on calixarene has been developed. The cavitand synthesis is modular and highly convergent, relying on a late-stage amide formation step that allows facile diversification with different chiral amines and straightforward access to either enantiomer of the host. This strategy provides access to a set of structurally diverse and conformationally flexible cavitands that efficiently bind fullerene derivatives. The resulting host–guest complexes exhibit an induced electronic circular dichroism response in the spectral window of the achiral fullerene chromophore. The modular nature of the cavitand scaffold allows tuning of the chiroptical response of a given fullerene across the visible spectrum.

The corresponding paper was published recently:

A modular family of chiral cavitand receptors: tuning the chiroptical response of achiral fullerene guests

Hugo Marchi Luciano, Athul Santha Bhaskaran, Cristian Montiel-Andreotti, Eva Prat-Font, Fiza Fariha, Pere Galán-Masferrer, Marcel Swart, Agustí Lledó

Organic Chemistry Frontiers, 2026, 13, 4971–4978

DOI: 10.1039/d6qo00249h

Girona, September 18th, 2026
For more info: ges.iqcc@udg.edu