have been focused on the development of artificial catalysts with high efficiency,
which significantly advanced chemical industry, however, these industrial catalysts
are mostly used for the corresponding given reactions instead of a multi-type of
substrates, meaning the nonselective nature. Recently, inspired from natural catalysts, artificial switchable catalysts have attracted much attention due to their unique
capability of mimicking the selective catalytic behavior of enzymes [47]. The
selectivity involves the stimuli-responsive on/off mode in catalytic activity, meaning
that these catalysts can be active in a transformation in one state and inactive in the
other state. As demonstrated, rotaxanes provide a reliable platform for the construction of stimuli-responsive catalytic systems [48] (Fig. 6).
Fig. 5 Schematic representation of a series of rotaxane-type fluorescent molecular switches
developed by our group [30c, 46]
11 Functional Rotaxanes
289
which significantly advanced chemical industry, however, these industrial catalysts
are mostly used for the corresponding given reactions instead of a multi-type of
substrates, meaning the nonselective nature. Recently, inspired from natural catalysts, artificial switchable catalysts have attracted much attention due to their unique
capability of mimicking the selective catalytic behavior of enzymes [47]. The
selectivity involves the stimuli-responsive on/off mode in catalytic activity, meaning
that these catalysts can be active in a transformation in one state and inactive in the
other state. As demonstrated, rotaxanes provide a reliable platform for the construction of stimuli-responsive catalytic systems [48] (Fig. 6).
Fig. 5 Schematic representation of a series of rotaxane-type fluorescent molecular switches
developed by our group [30c, 46]
11 Functional Rotaxanes
289