Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 30, 2026
09:25
Fabricating van der Waals Heterostructures with Precise Rotational Alignment
Published on: July 5, 2019
Extreme chirality in Swiss roll metamaterials
1The Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College, London SW7 2AZ, UK.
Summary
Researchers developed a chiral Swiss roll metamaterial with extreme chirality, achieving over 100 times greater effects than previous structures. This resonant magnetic medium enables significant polarization changes for light waves.
Area of Science:
- Metamaterials Science
- Electromagnetism
- Optics
Background:
- Chiral metamaterials are engineered structures exhibiting unique optical properties.
- Previous chiral structures have shown limited polarization rotation capabilities.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the extreme chiral behavior of a novel Swiss roll metamaterial.
- To demonstrate a significant enhancement in chiral effects for polarized waves.
Main Methods:
- Numerical simulations of wave propagation through the metamaterial.
- Analytical modeling to understand the chiral response.
- Experimental validation (implied).
Main Results:
- The chiral Swiss roll metamaterial acts as a resonant magnetic medium.
- It exhibits a negative refractive band for specific polarizations.
- Achieved polarization rotation of 90° in less than one wavelength.
- Chirality demonstrated to be over 100 times greater than prior art.
Conclusions:
- The Swiss roll metamaterial design enables unprecedented levels of chirality.
- This advancement opens possibilities for novel optical devices and polarization control.
Related Concept Videos
02:25Chirality
Chirality is a term that describes the lack of mirror symmetry in an object. In other words, chiral objects cannot be superposed on their mirror images. For example, our feet are chiral, as the mirror image of the left foot, the right foot, cannot be superposed on the left foot.
Chiral objects exhibit a sense of handedness when they interact with another chiral object. For example, our left foot can only fit in the left shoe and not in the right shoe. Achiral objects — objects that have...
Chiral objects exhibit a sense of handedness when they interact with another chiral object. For example, our left foot can only fit in the left shoe and not in the right shoe. Achiral objects — objects that have...
02:30Chirality in Nature
Chirality is the most intriguing yet essential facet of nature, governing life’s biochemical processes and precision. It can be observed from a snail shell pattern in a macroscopic world to an amino acid, the minutest building block of life. Most of the snails around the world have right-coiled shells because of the intrinsic chirality in their genes. All the amino acids present in the human body exist in an enantiomerically pure state, except for glycine - the sole achiral amino acid. The...
02:05Prochirality
The concept of prochirality leads to the nomenclature of the individual faces of a molecule and plays a crucial role in the enantioselective reaction. It is a concept where two or more achiral molecules react to produce chiral products. A typical process is the reaction of an achiral ketone to generate a chiral alcohol. Here, the achiral reactant reacts with an achiral reducing agent, sodium borohydride, to generate an equimolar mixture of the chiral enantiomers of the product. For example, an...
02:18Fischer Projections
Learning to draw Fischer projections of molecules and understanding their relevance plays a crucial role in the visual depiction of organic molecules. A Fischer projection is a two-dimensional projection on a planar surface to simplify the three-dimensional wedge–dash representation of molecules. This is especially helpful in the case of molecules with multiple chiral centers that can be difficult to draw. Here, all the bonds of interest are represented as horizontal or vertical lines. While...
02:33Stereoisomerism of Cyclic Compounds
In this lesson, we delve into the role of ring conformation and its stability, which determines the spatial arrangement and, consequently, the molecular symmetry and stereoisomerism of cyclic compounds. 1,2-Dimethylcyclohexane is used as a case study to evaluate the possible number of stereoisomers. Here, given the multiple (n = 2) chiral centers, there are 2n = 4 possible configurations that lack a plane of symmetry, as the ring skeleton exists in a non-planar chair conformation. In addition,...
02:30Chirality at Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Sulfur
Chirality is most prevalent in carbon-based tetrahedral compounds, but this important facet of molecular symmetry extends to sp3-hybridized nitrogen, phosphorus and sulfur centers, including trivalent molecules with lone pairs. Here, the lone pair behaves as a functional group in addition to the other three substituents to form an analogous tetrahedral center that can be chiral.
A consequence of chirality is the need for enantiomeric resolution. While this is theoretically possible for all...
A consequence of chirality is the need for enantiomeric resolution. While this is theoretically possible for all...