Demystifying the Solvent Sensitive Onset of Complexity and Chirality Transition in Hierarchically Organized Co-Assembled Organic-Inorganic Superstructures.

Programming the solvent mediated hierarchical organization and chirality transition in organic-inorganic co-assembled hybrid materials is attractive but still a challenge. The work presented in the manuscript reveals the development of solvent responsive R/S-Pyra-CEA building block which exhibited distinct absorption and chiroptical behavior in presence of Lewis base good co-solvents (THF/1,4-dioxane/DMSO) in self-assembled/co-assembled state in mixed aqueous media. The work proposes a simple strategy to employ subtle differences in the solvent characteristics as the control to direct the co-assembly of well-designed organic building block, inorganic component [Au (III) ions)], and chiral inducer (cysteine) through multiple hierarchical growth pathways for generating diverse chiral superstructures in mixed aqueous media which is unprecedented. The outcome of this study is expected to provide fresh insights for designing solvent sensitive building blocks to prepare nature mimic complex hierarchically organized chiral hybrid materials.