Self-assembly and nonlinear optical properties of a synthetic dipeptide

Article abstract of DOI:10.1039/c2jm34338j

The self-assembly propensities and nonlinear optical properties of synthetic dipeptides are illustrated. The single crystal X-ray diffraction study of dipeptide 1 containing a p-nitrophenylalanine moiety reveals that the peptide adopts a supramolecular antiparallel β-sheet structure using hydrogen bonding, as well as π-π stacking interactions, in the solid state and the peptide exhibits nonlocal thermal nonlinear refraction due to the thermal lensing effect. The heat dissipation in the dipeptide 1 was a slow process with a millisecond to microsecond time scale. However the peptide 2 containing a p-nitrophenylacetic acid moiety adopts a parallel β-sheet structure and has no thermal lensing effect.