Fluctuation induced chiral symmetry breaking in autocatalytic reaction-diffusion systems

Abstract

We show how spatiotemporal fluctuations can induce spontaneous symmetry breaking in systems which are perfectly symmetric in the absence of fluctuations. We illustrate this in the context of the autocatalytic production of chiral enantiomers from achiral reactants in reaction-diffusion systems. The mean field steady state is chiral symmetric; spatiotemporal fluctuations induce a novel (molecular) chiral ordering and sharp phase transitions including reentrance. We discuss its implications in the context of the emergence of molecular homochirality.