Diffusion Enhances Chirality Selection

Abstract

Diffusion effect on chirality selection in a two-dimensional reaction-diffusion model is studied by the Monte Carlo simulation. The model consists of achiral reactants A which turn into either of the chiral products, R or S, in a solvent of chemically inactive vacancies V. The reaction contains the nonlinear autocatalysis as well as recycling process, and the chiral symmetry breaking is monitored by an enantiomeric excess $\phi$. Without dilution a strong nonlinear autocatalysis ensures chiral symmetry breaking. By dilution, the chiral order $\phi$ decreases, and the racemic state is recovered below the critical concentration $c_c$. Diffusion effectively enhances the concentration of chiral species, and $c_c$ decreases as the diffusion coefficient $D$ increases. The relation between $\phi$ and $c$ for a system with a finite $D$ fits rather well to an interpolation formula between the diffusionless(D=0) and homogeneous ($D=\infty$) limits.