Antimicrobial resistance is among the most pressing healthcare challenges of our time. Multidrug-resistant ‘superbugs’ continue to emerge at an alarming rate, while antibiotic development has stalled in recent decades. Antimicrobial peptides have attracted interest for their potent bactericidal activity and lower propensity to spur resistance; however, translation into clinical practice has been hampered by poor bioavailability, challenging syntheses and limited stability. By contrast, synthetic copolymers mimicking antimicrobial peptides have received attention for their efficacy and synthetic tractability. Here we highlight recent advances in antimicrobial polymer development and discuss future directions for their design and implementation. We also outline future research directions, including the use of machine learning to guide polymer design and the development of scalable production methods that ensure the worldwide accessibility of these materials. Antimicrobial polymers offer an attractive tool for combating the crisis of antimicrobial resistance. This Review highlights recent advances in antimicrobial polymer development and discusses future directions, including the use of machine learning to guide polymer design and the development of scalable production methods to ensure global accessibility of these materials.
Chemotaxis—directed movement in response to environmental cues—is fundamental to biological systems but remains rare in artificial systems, where it typically relies on complex catalytic pathways or intricate adaptive designs. The molecular mechanisms underlying artificial chemotaxis are still scarce and poorly understood, posing challenges for the rational design of advanced artificial chemotactic systems. Here we present a minimal polymeric system that achieves negative chemotaxis through intrinsic conformational dynamics, enabling mechanical transduction and directional movement without the need for catalysis or external energy input. Our study uncovers a previously unrecognized molecular mechanism in which hydrophobic membrane domains dynamically reconfigure in response to chemical signals, triggering a cascade of events, from conformational rearrangements to interfacial tension alterations that generate self-sustained motile behaviour. By elucidating the interplay between membrane dynamics, interfacial forces and directional transport, our findings advance the molecular understanding of synthetic systems that emulate cytoskeletal remodelling in biological motility and establish a versatile framework for engineering functional artificial protocells with life-like behaviours. Achieving negative chemotaxis without catalytic designs remains challenging in artificial systems. Now it has been shown that intrinsic membrane conformational dynamics generate interfacial tension gradients, driving polymersomes away from a lactic-acid source without requiring external energy input.
Chiral helical superstructures provide a platform to control photon polarization and electron spin, yet they are challenging to construct using inorganic materials. Now, homochiral triple helices that exhibit pronounced circularly polarized luminescence have been assembled from gold by tailoring the steric and stereochemical properties of supporting chiral cyclic ligands.
While stereochemistry has a strong influence on polymer structure and assembly, its use as a design handle to regulate polymer network topology remains unexplored. Here we demonstrate that homochiral self-sorting can be harnessed to suppress primary loops in end-linked polymer networks. We synthesized linear polymers terminated with heterochiral bi-2-naphthol-based ligands that cross-link via palladium(II)-mediated Pd2L4 metal–organic cage (MOC) assembly. This design exploits a thermodynamic preference for homochiral MOCs, enforcing a bias against intramolecular cyclization. Compared with networks formed from homochiral polymers, which can form primary loops through MOC formation, networks formed from heterochiral polymers exhibit lower primary loop densities and enhanced mechanical properties. The presence of sacrificial loops at low concentrations also enables topology editing by adding functionalized free ligands with minimal impact on network integrity. This work establishes chiral self-sorting as a versatile approach to controlling polymer topology and provides a generalizable strategy for designing robust and functional polymer networks. Stereochemistry greatly influences polymer structure and assembly, yet its use in controlling polymer network topology remains underexplored. Now, homochiral self-sorting is used to suppress primary-loop formation in end-linked polymer networks, offering a strategy for controlling network topology.
