Chirality of anisotropic metal nanowires with a distinct multihelix.

Two-dimensional (2D) anisotropic silver nanowire (AgNW) arrays, fabricated inside chiral mesoporous silica (CMS), exhibited strong and tunable plasmon circular dichroism (CD) signals in the visible and near-IR regions due to collective dipole coupling between the anisotropic AgNWs. The multihelix with a helical channel orientation and helical arrays of opposite handedness in CMS played a predominant effects on the transversal and longitudinal chirality of the AgNWs, respectively.This behavior differs from both isotropic-nanoparticle and single-helix-induced CD responses. This system will provide new insight into the optical activity of metal inorganic nanoparticles capped with chiral organic molecules and assembled in chiral environments.