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Updated: Jan 28, 2026

A Technique to Functionalize and Self-assemble Macroscopic Nanoparticle-ligand Monolayer Films onto Template-free Substrates
Published on: May 9, 2014
Self-Assembled Chiral Nanoparticle Superstructures and Identification of Their Collective Optical Activity from
Xiang Mao1, Zhenyu Wang1, Deping Zeng1
1State Key Laboratory of Ultrasound Engineering in Medicine Co-founded by Chongqing and MOST, College of Biomedical Engineering , Chongqing Medical University , Chongqing 400016 , PR China.
Abstract:
The spontaneous self-assembly of chiral nanoparticles (NPs) into stationary fabrication has garnered great interest in technique investigation and science advancement due to its expected apparent properties via orderly collective behaviors. However, this kind of characterization of assembled nanoparticles superstructure (NPS) is rarely reported and is distinguished with monodispersed chiral NPs. In this work, we used l-cysteine (Cys) as the chiral molecule in the form of functional surfactant, which had capped CdS/CdTe NPs and was treated as a linkage bridge for constructing orderly assembled NPS. Among the circular dichrosim (CD) phenomenon, Cys ligands exhibit related changes in CD absorption, while whole-molecule solution was used for treatment in different pH-controlling procedures. Synthesized chiral NPs are organized into ordered rod-shaped NPS during the spontaneous self-assembly process, and the CD response of NPS is monitored in different cultivating times; it showed a persuasive response appears in sum frequency generation (SFG) spectroscopy. Both experimental works and theory calculation convey that the ordered stacking of chiral stabilizer and the chirality of NPS, which are identified from chiral molecular status and their collective optical activity, originated from ligand asymmetry.
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