Scientists are discovering new ways to control and manipulate chirality—the handedness property of molecules and materials—through electric currents, magnetic fields, and light. Recent breakthroughs show chirality can be switched reversibly in materials like MoS₂ and proteins, with researchers developing imaging techniques and theoretical models to understand how this fundamental property emerges in nature.
·Electric current polarity can reversibly reorient chirality in cubic chiral magnets
·MoS₂ materials achieve chirality switching to generate spin currents without requiring magnetic fields
·Terahertz imaging now maps spatial chirality patterns at 100-micrometer resolution
·Plasmonic assemblies and proteins can induce reversible chirality changes through optical interactions
·New mechanism identified linking molecular chirality to the origin of life's handedness bias
drawn from Nature, Phys.org, Cambridge University Press & Assessment, Chemical & Engineering News · updated 10h ago