Chiral Symmetry Breaking Induced by Temperature Fluctuation in an Open System to Mimic Chirality Evolution in Nature

Abstract

The chiral symmetry breaking during the nucleation and growth of sodium chlorate and sodium bromate from their aqueous solutions was investigated under natural unstirred conditions. The results suggested that temperature fluctuation inherently existing in nature is a possible main driving force causing fluctuating supersaturation conditions, under which the chiral symmetry breaking is induced. Density gradient in the solution associated with water evaporation and solute concentration variation causes natural convection, which was found to amplify the existed biased handed structure to yield high value of the absolute crystal enantiomeric excess (CEE) in the absence of external stirring. Experimental results also showed that the chiral symmetry breaking process induced by temperature fluctuation is not significantly affected by the presence of achiral solid particles.