Selective binding of rare-earth ions in polymerizable cages†

Abstract

We assembled metal–organic cages by combining rare-earth metals with an alkene-terminated ligand (L), allowing for subsequent thiol–ene polymerization of the cages to yield rare-earth-binding polymer networks. Mixed-metal self-assembly experiments with ligand L show that the size ratio of the respective rare-earth metals dictates the metal composition of the cages.