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Updated: Sep 26, 2025

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Published on: August 18, 2017
Spontaneous chiral resolution of pentahelicene molecules on Cd(0001)
1School of Physical Science and Technology & Chongqing Key Laboratory of Micro&Nano Structure Optoelectronics, Southwest University, Chongqing 400715, China. skqtt@swu.edu.cn.
Abstract:
Chiral resolution is of fundamental importance to conglomerate or racemate crystallization. Here we demonstrate that the spontaneous chiral resolution of pentahelicene racemates occurred in the monolayer domains. When deposited on a Cd(0001) surface, pentahelicene molecules crystallize into a commensurate (6 × 6)R0° structure built mainly from homochiral trimers. Spontaneous chirality separation takes place in the form of opposite mirror domains, where 2D enantiomorphism is not expressed by the oblique adlattice, but by the supramolecular chirality of the pentahelicene trimers. Furthermore, annealing the sample or extreme close-packing lead to the presence of lattice handedness through the formation of a porous network structure or an edge-on phase. These results provide valuable insight for 2D conglomerate crystallization and stereochemical recognition.
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