New paper in Science Advances

20 02 2025

Check out our new paper in Science Advances co-authored by Dr. Wojciech Danowski in collaboration with the University of Groningen, University of Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and Uppsala University (Sweden).

General strategy for boosting the performance of speed-tunable rotary molecular motors with visible light
Science Advances, 2025, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adr9326

Light-driven molecular rotary motors enable chirality-controlled unidirectional rotation, making them valuable tools for constructing dynamic molecular systems, actuating materials, and complex synthetic machinery. However, until now, achieving high photoefficiency, visible-light responsiveness, synthetic accessibility, and tunable dynamics within a single molecule has remained challenging. Here, we present highly photoefficient, visible-light–responsive molecular motors (MMs) with tunable speeds, achieved through a simple one-step formylation. The introduction of a formyl group redshifts excitation wavelengths, enhances photoisomerization quantum yields, and improves photostationary state distributions, resulting in motors that outperform previously developed systems. This late-stage functionalization strategy expands possibilities for high-performance molecular machines and devices, marking a significant advance in synthetic molecular design.