Controlled Synthesis of Au Chiral Propellers from Seeded Growth of Au Nanoplates for Chiral Differentiation of Biomolecules

Abstract

Chiral plasmonic nanocrystals are promising materials for applications in enantioselective catalysis, DNA detection, and medical diagnosis. Herein, we demonstrate a simple and versatile strategy that produces plasmonic nanostructures with strong chiroptical responses by a chiral ligand mediated seeded growth approach. By modulation of the surface coverage of chiral ligands on Au nanotriangles, propeller-like structures with the growth of three arms on the tips of the triangles are produced with a high anisotropy factor. Finally, these Au chiral propellers can be used as substrates for the surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) detection of chiral biomolecules, achieving chiral differentiation for enantiomers of biomolecules.

Chiral plasmonic nanostructures: recent advances in their synthesis and applications

“…[83][84][85] In most cases, a chiral molecule or biomolecule, such as an amino-acid, is used as a template to induce the chiral shape during nanoparticle synthesis. 86 For example, H. Lee et al employed amino-acids and peptides to guide the growth of chiral gold helicoids on a cubic or octahedral seed (Fig. 4A).…”

Selenocystine and Photo‐Irradiation Directed Growth of Helically Grooved Gold Nanoarrows

“…[ 27 ] Ma and Wei et al reported the Au chiral propellers by a seed‐mediated growth approach from Au nanotriangles using enantiomeric cysteine as the directing agents. [ 28 ] Previously, we obtained a helically grooved gold nanoarrows (HeliGNAs) and found that the introduction of cysteine or glutathione (GSH) as the shaping modifiers could lead to the formation of nanoarrows with helical grooves. [ 29 ] Depending on the strong AuS bond, chirality could be transferred from the molecular level to plasmonic level.…”

Plasmonic Chiral Metamaterials with Sub-10 nm Nanogaps

“…Chiral metamaterials have been widely studied for biology, living science, ultrasensitive chiral sensing, and enantiomer separation. − The chiroptical properties were mainly produced by structure asymmetry − and chiral molecules. − Current studies are focused on chiral plasmonic metamaterials with structural asymmetry, such as 3D stacked-patch plasmonic metamaterials, chiral plasmonic nanostructure, chiral Au nanohook, etc ., exhibiting markedly improved chiroptical responses and tunability within the visible wavelength due to the surface plasmon resonance. Moreover, Au chiral propellers and chiral nanostructured Au films were synthesized with the addition of chiral ligands and molecules, which were proven to be surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrates for achieving chiral differentiation of chiral biomolecules.…”