Symmetry Breaking of Molecules Triggered by Chiral Inorganic Nanostructures Without Organic Components

Chirality transfer has garnered significant attention due to its potential to revolutionize asymmetric synthesis of enantiopure compounds and to provide fundamental insights into molecular symmetry breaking, which is widely believed to underlie the pervasive phenomenon of homochirality in biological systems. While organic-to-organic and organic-to-inorganic chirality transfers have been extensively studied, the inorganic-to-organic counterpart remains challenging due to the dimensional mismatch between the nanoscale of inorganic materials and the molecular scale of organic compounds, the thermodynamic instability of chiral inorganic lattices, and the uncontrollable influence of defects on chirality transfer. This review summarizes the synthesis of organic-free chiral nano-inorganic materials and explores the concept of inorganic-to-organic chirality transfer via symmetry breaking induced by these materials through three proposed pathways: enantiospecific inorganic-organic interactions, chirality transfer from circularly polarized light to molecules, electron spin-determined enantiopreferential reactions governed by chiral-induced spin selectivity. Inorganic-to-organic chirality transfer via symmetry breaking offers a novel framework for investigating spin chemistry, advancing asymmetric synthesis, enabling enantioselective production of single-enantiomer pharmaceuticals, and elucidating the origin of homochirality on prebiotic Earth.