Nucleotide-Catalyzed Conversion of Racemic Zeolite-Type Zincophosphate into Enantioenriched Crystals

摘要

Homochirality is a ubiquitous feature in living systems and plays a crucial role in biological processes. Many naturally occurring biochemical molecules such as proteins, nucleic acids, and carbohydrates are homochiral. In comparison, homochirality in inorganic compounds is quite a rare phenomenon. For example, even though quartz is chiral, it is found in nature in both right- and left-handed forms. Also, unlike homochiral organic molecules chirality in inorganic systems often depends on the crystallization process that allows the generation of chirality through the organization of achiral inorganic units into the enantiomorphous space group. This crystallization process, however, almost always generates a mixture of right- and left-handed crystals, even though statistical fluctuations may occasionally result in enantioenriched bulk samples.