Surfactant-Mediated Synthesis of Twisted Cu 2– x S Nanobowties with Chirality Continuum toward Enantioselective Catalysis

The influence of achiral surfactants on synergistically chiral effect of interfacial nucleation, assembly orientation, and morphological evolution in chiral nanostructural synthesis via a chemical solution method is largely ignored and underexplored. Herein, we report a surfactant-mediated continuous evolution of chiral Cu2-xS (0 < x < 1) from layered nanosheets to twisted nanobowties (TNBs) and uncovered a multiscale chirality amplification mechanism driven by tilted stacking of coordination nanosheets. Surfactant identity, including headgroup and alkyl chain length, controls the potential, adsorption strength, and density, as well as tail packing of interfacial layers formed by Cu²⁺-cysteine coordination units, thereby directing their assembly pathway. In particular, in sodium dodecyl sulfate, the anionic headgroups electrostatically anchor coordination-derived nanoparticles, while the hydrophobic tails form a dense interfacial soft-template that directs nucleation and anisotropic growth of coordination nanosheets. Under the stereochemical control of chiral cysteine, these nanosheets undergo progressive intersheet tilting and hierarchical stacking, ultimately evolving into micrometer-scale TNBs. Catalytic oxidation of 3,4-dihydroxy-l/d-phenylalanine reveals that higher structural dimensionality and increased chiroptical response of Cu2-xS improve catalytic activity and enantioselectivity. This work demonstrates a surfactant-mediated interfacial soft-template strategy for the rational design of chiral inorganic materials and the translation of molecular asymmetry into continuously tunable micrometer-scale architectures for enantioselective catalysis.