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An object that is not chiral is said to be achiral. A chiral object and its mirror image are said to be enantiomorphs. The word chirality is derived from the Greek χείρ (cheir), the hand, the most familiar chiral object; the word enantiomorph stems from the Greek ἐναντίος (enantios) 'opposite' + μορφή (morphe) 'form'.
The simplest chiral knot is the trefoil knot, which was shown to be chiral by Max Dehn. All nontrivial torus knots are chiral. The Alexander polynomial cannot distinguish a knot from its mirror image, but the Jones polynomial can in some cases; if V k ( q ) ≠ V k ( q −1 ), then the knot is chiral, however the converse is not true.
A non-chiral figure is called achiral or amphichiral. The helix (and by extension a spun string, a screw, a propeller, etc.) and Möbius strip are chiral two-dimensional objects in three-dimensional ambient space. The J, L, S and Z-shaped tetrominoes of the popular video game Tetris also exhibit chirality, but only in a two-dimensional space.
A chiral phenomenon is one that is not identical to its mirror image (see the article on mathematical chirality).The spin of a particle may be used to define a handedness, or helicity, for that particle, which, in the case of a massless particle, is the same as chirality.
Chiral molecules are always dissymmetric (lacking S n) but not always asymmetric (lacking all symmetry elements except the trivial identity). Asymmetric molecules are always chiral. [6] The following table shows some examples of chiral and achiral molecules, with the Schoenflies notation of the point group of the molecule.
The full tetrahedral group T d with fundamental domain. T d, *332, [3,3] or 4 3m, of order 24 – achiral or full tetrahedral symmetry, also known as the (2,3,3) triangle group. This group has the same rotation axes as T, but with six mirror planes, each through two 3-fold axes. The 2-fold axes are now S 4 (4) axes.
Chirality with hands and two enantiomers of a generic amino acid The direction of current flow and induced magnetic flux follow a "handness" relationship. The term chiral / ˈ k aɪ r əl / describes an object, especially a molecule, which has or produces a non-superposable mirror image of itself.
Enantioselective synthesis, also called asymmetric synthesis, [1] is a form of chemical synthesis.It is defined by IUPAC as "a chemical reaction (or reaction sequence) in which one or more new elements of chirality are formed in a substrate molecule and which produces the stereoisomeric (enantiomeric or diastereomeric) products in unequal amounts."