Charge-assisted hydrogen-bonded networks

The importance of hydrogen bonds is widely recognized because of their role in defining the structure and properties of many compounds, including water, proteins, DNA, and polymers. Hydrogen bonding also has emerged as a critical tool in solid-state chemistry, in which the versatility of organic synthesis has been combined with the structure-directing properties of hydrogen-bond donor-acceptor pairs to steer molecular assembly into networks that reflect the symmetries of their molecular constituents. Although these efforts have been largely empirical, the dominance of hydrogen bonding among the multitude of intermolecular forces often leads to predictable control of crystal structure. Although charge-assisted hydrogen bonds (donors and acceptors with ionic character that reinforce the electrostatic character of the hydrogen bond) have been recognized for decades, their use in network design, particularly for "crystal engineering," has grown substantially in the past decade. The evidence suggests that charge-assisted hydrogen bonds introduce extraordinary robustness to molecular networks that reflects a combination of strong intermolecular forces and structural compliance, thus facilitating design of organic solid-state materials.