See the ‘periodic table’ of molecular knots
Fashioning these structures is a way for chemists to test their mettle
Like a scouting handbook for the molecular realm, a new chart reveals how to tie molecules up in knots of increasing complexity.
Mathematicians have cataloged billions of distinct knot types, but researchers have been able to make only a few molecular versions. Scientists craft the minuscule knots using a solution filled with building blocks of curved strings of atoms, which glom onto one another.
Now, using computer simulations, physicist Cristian Micheletti of the International School for Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy, and colleagues have created a “periodic table” of the molecular pretzels. The table reveals which molecular knots are able to be created and arranges them in order of increasing complexity, the researchers report August 3 in Nature Communications.