A gold–copper strategy for building interlocked nitrogen-doped carbon nanohoops

Catenanes are molecules in which two or more rings are mechanically interlocked like the links of a chain, without any chemical bonds between them. Since Jean-Pierre Sauvage, who later shared the 2016 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, reported an efficient metal-templated synthesis in 1983, catenanes have attracted attention as fundamental frameworks for molecular machines.