This is the accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Wiley at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adom.201400333/abstract.The gyroid is a continuous and triply periodic cubic morphology which
possesses a constant mean curvature surface across a range of volumetric fill fractions.
Found in a variety of natural and synthetic systems which form through self-assembly,
from butterfly wing scales to block copolymers, the gyroid also exhibits an inherent
chirality not observed in any other similar morphologies. These unique geometrical
properties impart to gyroid structured materials a host of interesting optical properties.
Depending on the length scale on which the constituent materials are organised,
these properties arise from starkly different physical mechanisms (such as a complete
photonic band gap for photonic crystals and a greatly depressed plasma frequency
for optical metamaterials). This article reviews the theoretical predictions and
experimental observations of the optical properties of two fundamental classes of gyroid
structured materials: photonic crystals (wavelength scale) and metamaterials (subwavelength
scale).This work was supported by the EPSRC through the Cambridge
NanoDTC EP/G037221/1, EP/G060649/1, EP/L027151/1, and ERC LINASS 320503