Megalo‐Cavitands: Synthesis of Acridane4arenes and Formation of Large, Deep Cavitands for Selective C70 Uptake

Abstract Deep cavitands, concave molecular containers, represent an important supramolecular host class that has been explored for a variety of applications ranging from sensing, switching, purification and adsorption to catalysis. A major limitation in the field has been the cavitand volume that is restricted by the size of the structural platform utilized (diameter approx. 7 Å). We here report the synthesis of a novel, unprecedentedly large structural platform, named acridane4arene (diameter approx. 14 Å), suitable for the construction of cavitands with volumes of up to 814 Å 3 . These megalo‐cavitands serve as size‐selective hosts for fullerenes with mM to sub‐μM binding affinity for C 60 and C 70 . Furthermore, the selective binding of fullerene C 70 in the presence of C 60 was demonstrated.