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Chirality in Nature

Chirality 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.

Chirality

Chirality

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...

Molecules with Multiple Chiral Centers

Molecules with Multiple Chiral Centers

Molecules that possess multiple chiral centers can afford a large number of stereoisomers. For instance, while some molecules like 2-butanol have one chiral center, defined as a tetrahedral carbon atom with four different substituents attached, several molecules like butane-2,3-diol have multiple chiral centers. A simple formula to predict the number of stereoisomers possible for a molecule with n chiral centers is 2n. However, there can be a lower number where some of the stereoisomers are...

Chirality at Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Sulfur

Chirality 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...

Valence Bond Theory

Valence Bond Theory

Coordination compounds and complexes exhibit different colors, geometries, and magnetic behavior, depending on the metal atom/ion and ligands from which they are composed. In an attempt to explain the bonding and structure of coordination complexes, Linus Pauling proposed the valence bond theory, or VBT, using the concepts of hybridization and the overlapping of the atomic orbitals. According to VBT, the central metal atom or ion (Lewis acid) hybridizes to provide empty orbitals of suitable...

Prochirality

Prochirality

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...

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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jan 10, 2026

Coulomb Explosion Imaging as a Tool to Distinguish Between Stereoisomers

Coulomb Explosion Imaging as a Tool to Distinguish Between Stereoisomers

Published on: August 18, 2017

Chiral valley edge states based on Dirac mass engineering.

Jian-Wei Liu^1,2, Gui-Geng Liu^3,4, Bo Zhang¹

¹School of Physics & State Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Materials and Technologies, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, China.

Nature Communications

|November 27, 2025

Summary

Valleytronics offers energy-efficient computing, but backscattering limits performance. This study introduces chiral valley edge states in topological photonic crystals for backscattering-free propagation and valley polarization, enabling robust information processing.

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Last Updated: Jan 10, 2026

Coulomb Explosion Imaging as a Tool to Distinguish Between Stereoisomers

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Published on: August 18, 2017

Fabricating van der Waals Heterostructures with Precise Rotational Alignment

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Published on: July 5, 2019

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Area of Science:

Condensed Matter Physics
Photonics
Quantum Information Science

Background:

Valleytronics leverages the valley degree of freedom in materials for advanced information processing.
Backscattering-induced valley depolarization is a key challenge limiting device performance.
Topological photonic crystals offer robust edge states with potential for valley manipulation.

Purpose of the Study:

To develop a general approach for realizing chiral valley edge states in topological photonic crystals.
To enable backscattering-free propagation of valley-polarized waves.
To introduce valley multiplexing for independent control of valley-polarized signals.

Main Methods:

Integration of robust chiral edge states with the valley degree of freedom.
Control of valley Dirac masses to confine chiral edge bands to a single valley.
Engineering of Dirac masses in momentum and real spaces for valley multiplexing.

Main Results:

Demonstration of selective confinement of chiral edge bands, enabling backscattering-free propagation and valley polarization.
Proposal and demonstration of valley multiplexing for arbitrary control of distinct valley-polarized waves.
Development of a valley (de-)multiplexer and a valley-locked waveguide crossing for low-crosstalk signal routing.

Conclusions:

The proposed approach establishes an interplay between topological quantum Hall and valley Hall phases.
This work provides a new framework for robust, energy-efficient, and high-speed valley-based information processing.
The demonstrated valley multiplexing functionality is crucial for future integrated photonic circuits.