Despite the coplanar structure, a conjugated alternating copolymer forms amorphous, well-defined microspheres without π-stacked crystalline domains. Here, we gain insights into the mechanism of how the coplanar conjugated polymer forms amorphous microspheres by means of spectroscopic studies on the assembly/disassembly processes. The difference of the spectral profiles of photoabsorption and photoluminescence with varying solvent/nonsolvent composition clarifies that stepwise assembly takes place through the microsphere formation; [1] intrapolymer linear-to-folding transformation upon diffusion of polar nonsolvent and [2] interpolymer assembly of the foldamers upon further addition of the nonsolvent to form microspheres. As shown in various biopolymers such as proteins and DNA, such stepwise folding and assembly behaviors of conjugated polymers from primary to secondary and tertiary structure open a new way to create transformable functional materials.

中文翻译：

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从线性到Foldamer和组装：共面共轭聚合物到微球的分层转换

尽管具有共面结构，但共轭交替共聚物形成无π堆积晶畴的无定形，定义明确的微球。在这里，我们通过对组装/拆卸过程的光谱研究，深入了解了共面共轭聚合物如何形成非晶微球的机理。随着溶剂/非溶剂组成的变化，光吸收和光致发光的光谱图谱的差异表明，逐步组装是通过微球的形成而发生的。[1]极性非溶剂扩散时的聚合物内线性至折叠转变，以及[2]进一步添加非溶剂形成微球后的折叠剂互聚物组装。如各种生物聚合物（例如蛋白质和DNA）所示，