Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 1, 2025

Coulomb Explosion Imaging as a Tool to Distinguish Between Stereoisomers
Published on: August 18, 2017
Revealing Local Structures of Chiral Molecules via X-ray Circular Dichroism
Ramesh Jarupula1, Haiwang Yong1,2
1Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, United States.
Abstract:
Chirality is crucial due to its role in biological and chemical systems, where molecular handedness impacts structure and function. Chiral molecules with nonsuperimposable mirror images exhibit distinct biological activities pivotal in drug design and catalysis. This theoretical study explores X-ray circular dichroism (XCD) as a tool for probing the local structures of chiral molecules. We calculated the XCD signals at the chlorine, oxygen, and nitrogen K edges in various molecular systems. Our results show that electron delocalization plays an important role in the sensitivity of XCD to X-ray chromophore-chiral center distance. Furthermore, the XCD signals at multiple X-ray chromophores could offer multidimensional insights to pinpoint chiral center, providing spatial information about the local structures of complex chiral molecules.
Related Concept Videos
X-ray Diffraction of Biological Samples
According to Bragg's law, when X-rays strike the sample positioned on a stage, the rays are scattered by the electron clouds around the sample atoms. The X-ray diffraction or scattering is caused by constructive interference of the X-ray waves that reflect off the internal...
Chirality in Nature
X-ray Crystallography
Diffraction
Diffraction is the change in the direction of travel experienced by an electromagnetic wave when it encounters a physical barrier whose dimensions are comparable to those of the wavelength of the light. X-rays are electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths about as long as the distance between neighboring...
Chirality
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...
Molecules with Multiple Chiral Centers
Stereoisomerism of Cyclic Compounds

