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High-throughput chiral copper foils by curved-surface confinement recrystallization

  • Deping Huang
  • , Zhancheng Li
  • , Yinwu Duan
  • , Xin li
  • , Yongna Zhang
  • , Jiaxing Dong
  • , Guilin Wu
  • , Xiaoxu Huang
  • , Leining Zhang*
  • , Feng Ding*
  • , Haofei Shi*
  • *Corresponding author for this work
  • CAS - Chongqing Institute of Green and Intelligent Technology
  • University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
  • National Engineering Research Center for Instrument Functional Materials
  • Southwest University
  • Chongqing University
  • Beijing Institute of Technology
  • Suzhou Laboratory

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Chiral metal surfaces play a pivotal role in enantioselective catalysis, sensing, and spintronics, yet their scalable fabrication remains challenging due to a reliance on chiral templates or molecular precursors, which limits both throughput and precise control of crystallographic orientation. Here, we report a high-throughput method for fabricating chiral copper surfaces via curved-surface confinement recrystallization. This approach exploits curvature-driven abnormal grain growth to transform polycrystalline foils into large-area crystals with continuously graded high-index surfaces. Systematic control of the curvature during annealing enabled the creation of a library of chiral copper surfaces, providing high-throughput and surface templates with defined chirality. Through manipulation of the initial crystal orientation and curvature, single crystals with tailored surface orientations can be reached. The intrinsic chirality of these surfaces is confirmed by circular dichroism spectroscopy and model asymmetric reactions. Furthermore, we demonstrate the transfer of chirality to epitaxial two-dimensional materials, exemplified by the growth of chiral graphene. This work provides a scalable platform for producing designer chiral surfaces, enabling future advances in asymmetric catalysis and chiral device engineering.

Original languageEnglish
Article number2796
JournalNature Communications
Volume17
Issue number1
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2026
Externally publishedYes

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