10.1021/acs.biomac.6b00752.s001 Kai Tao Kai Tao Guy Jacoby Guy Jacoby Luba Burlaka Luba Burlaka Roy Beck Roy Beck Ehud Gazit Ehud Gazit Design of Controllable Bio-Inspired Chiroptic Self-Assemblies American Chemical Society 2016 myristic acid chain chromophore FFK chiroptic template nanoribbon Cotton effect self-assemblie chiral FK nanofiber superstructure Controllable Bio-Inspired Chiroptic Self-Assemblies Modulation lipopeptide 2016-07-26 00:00:00 Journal contribution https://acs.figshare.com/articles/journal_contribution/Design_of_Controllable_Bio-Inspired_Chiroptic_Self-Assemblies/3519596 Modulation of chiroptics, chiral phenomena of the optical properties, is pivotal in a variety of advanced applications, including chirality-specific biosensing and photonic switches. One of the most effective methods for achieving this control is assembly of the optical moieties into chiral nanostructures. Lipopeptide self-assemblies have been extensively employed as soft templates to organize composites into low-dimensional superstructures due to their rigidity and ease of functionalization. Therefore, an appealing approach is to provide chiroptical control by using lipopeptide self-assemblies as templates to assemble chromophores. Herein, two lipopeptidic molecules, namely, C<sub>14</sub>–FFK and C<sub>14</sub>–FK, composed of phenylalanine and lysine residues conjugated to a myristic acid chain, were custom-designed. Spectroscopic and microscopic characterizations indicated that C<sub>14</sub>–FFK self-assembled to wide, slightly left-handed nanoribbons, while C<sub>14</sub>–FK formed narrow, intensely right-handed nanofibers. The different chirality was derived from the distinct self-assembly driving forces, especially the molecular bending dimensions. These superstructures presented an ideal capability to serve as soft templates to assemble porphyrin (ZnTPyP) through noncovalent electrostatic attractive interactions, or assemble the phenolic groups through covalent conjugation to peptide backbones. The distinct exciton coupling of the chromophores allowed their achiral optics to become chiral, showing negative Cotton effect when templated by nanoribbons and positive Cotton effect with nanofibers as templates. Following replacement of the lipopeptides with their d-type enantiomers, the handedness of the superstructures and the associated chiroptics were reversed and presented “mirror” symmetric CD signals to their l-type counterparts. These findings may pave the way to the formation of morphologically and chioptically controllable nanomaterials.