If the nanostructures have residues affected by pH of the environment (like amine groups, hydroxide groups and any other hydrogen acceptors and donators), then the pH of the environment would effect the formation of nanostructures by addition or subtraction of hydrogen groups, and thereby forming or removing some charged residues on the monomers of the nanostructures. These addition/removal of charged residues will affect the gathering of the monomers for formation of nanostructures definitely.
But even if those hydrogen acceptors and donators are absent in the nanostructuresm and lets say, it is composed of metal ions; then, similarly those metal residues will be affected by protonation at lower pH values, and get corroded in the example of iron (Fe).
And of course this changes can be used as advantages, for example for microfluidics, or lab-on-a-chip sensors that use pH as a changing variable for indication of data. This way, the change of the shape of the nanowire can be sensed as a data and revealed.
The attached document shows the behaviour of some metals at different pH values of the solution as simple as it gets.
I hope it helps.
Cheers
If nano silica is your issue, read our papers in:
J. Phys. Chem. C 115 (2011) 24788-24799;
ACS Symp. Ser. 1133 (2013) 113-134
If you mention the material specifically, it is easy to provide some answer to your question.
I have mentioned it earlier that it is specifically for Te nanowires.
Normally to understand behavior of such materials at different pH a Pourbaix diagrams should be studied. For Te see below.
http://books.google.com/books?id=B8WgWHjN54oC&pg=PA65&lpg=PA65&dq=pourbaix+diagram+tellurium&source=bl&ots=qR82ZvN8hl&sig=grXxvvxo2WwlSISuxulAFDqnO7I&hl=en&sa=X&ei=T_qpUtbjJYv9oAS8kIA4&ved=0CCkQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=pourbaix%20diagram%20tellurium&f=false
I suggest to try both Mediums and try to discover the fact experimentally because you cannot tell without trying it
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