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May Two Enantiomers Have Different Raman Spectra?
Gianluigi Albano1, Gennaro Pescitelli2
1Dipartimento di Scienze Chimiche, della Vita e della Sostenibilità Ambientale, Università degli Studi di Parma, Parma, Italy.
Abstract:
A recent publication by Kopec et al., "The effect of enantiomers of thalidomide on colon cells-Raman spectroscopy studies", reported to "demonstrate that Raman spectroscopy reveals distinct spectral differences between the enantiomers of thalidomide" and provided both experimental and computational evidence. However, the theory of Raman spectroscopy inherently establishes that two enantiomers must exhibit identical Raman frequencies and intensities. While the slightly different experimental Raman spectra for the two enantiomers of thalidomide can be traced back to samples with different chemical and/or optical purities, the significant discrepancies observed in the computed Raman spectra arise from a computational artifact related to methodological shortcomings.
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