10.1039/c2cc00056c
The research focuses on the ligand-dependent synthetic approach and chiroptical properties of gold clusters protected with bicyclic chiral thiolates. The experiments involved the preparation of chiral gold clusters stabilized by enantiopure thiolates, specifically Au25 clusters, using a one-phase size-focusing approach. The reactants included camphorthiol and 1-phenylethylthiol (1-PET) as ligands, and the gold clusters were size-selected and characterized using circular dichroism (CD), mass spectrometry, UV-Vis spectroscopy, and gel permeation chromatography (GPC) for size separation. The study revealed that the product distribution and optical activity of the gold clusters were significantly influenced by the choice of ligand, with camphorthiol yielding a mixture of different-sized clusters and 1-PET resulting in a polydisperse mixture without the formation of Au25 clusters. The analyses showed that the Au25(CamS)18 cluster had a mass slightly higher than expected, suggesting a reduction of the carbonyl group in the camphorthiol ligand due to the catalytic activity of the gold cluster. The CD spectra of the isolated fractions exhibited good mirror-image relationships for both enantiomers, indicating the ligand's influence on the optical activity of the gold clusters.