Chiral effect on a self-assembling bicopper complex

A bicopper complex was prepared with chiral ligands. The self-assembly of the complex in trans-decalin differed greatly for the racemic and nonracemic ligands. With the latter the resulting gel formed at a lower concentration and exhibited a higher thermal transition temperature. A large optical activity was found in the nonracemic bicopper complex, which was used to probe the process of filament formation, i.e., the aggregation-dissociation process. The material with nonracemic ligands may form a longer nanoscopic filament.