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Updated: Jul 11, 2026

Interfacial Molecular-level Structures of Polymers and Biomacromolecules Revealed via Sum Frequency Generation Vibrational Spectroscopy
Published on: August 13, 2019
Chiral discrimination of a gemini-type surfactant with rigid spacer at the air-water interface
B Vijai Shankar1, Archita Patnaik
1Department of Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai 600 036, India.
Abstract:
Spontaneous separation of chiral phases was observed in the monolayers of a racemate of gemini-type twin-tailed, twin-chiral amphiphiles, (2R,3R)-(+)-bis(decyloxy)succinic acid and (2S,3S)-(-)-bis(decyloxy)succinic acid. The pressure-area isotherms of the interfacial monolayers formed at the liquid-air interface, and the 2D lattice structures studied through surface probe measurements revealed that the racemate exhibits a homochiral discrimination of the enantiomers in two dimensions. An enantiomeric excess (e,e) of 20% was sufficient to break the chiral symmetry at the air-water interface for a homochiral interaction. Langmuir monolayers on ZnCl2 and CaCl2 subphases manifested chiral discrimination with Zn2+ evidencing homochiral interaction with a chelate-type complex, whereas Ca2+ resulted in a heterochiral interaction forming an ionic-type complex. For the chiral asymmetric units, oblique and rectangular unit cells of the racemic monolayer had exclusive requirements of homo- and heterochiral recognitions for Zn2+ and Ca2+ ions, respectively. Monolayers transferred from the condensed phase at 25 mN/m onto hydrophilic Si(100) and quartz substrates revealed the formation of bilayers through transfer-induced monolayer buckling. The emergence of homochiral discrimination was explained using the effective-pair-potential (EPP) approach.
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