New Functional Materials Based on Self-Assembling Organogels: From Serendipity towards Design

Small organic gelling agents very efficiently self-assemble into an entangled network in a wide variety of organic solvents, thereby turning the liquid into a gel. Recent progress in the design of organogelators led to tailor-made gelling agents for supercritical CO2. Furthermore, such agents can be used as templates for the construction of novel materials and as responsive gel systems. The picture shows switchable organogels and indicates schematically how viscoelastic properties can be affected.