Catalysis and Separations with One Hand

Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh PA

Investigators

Abstract

The objective of this project is to explore the fundamental aspects of enantioselective chemistry on chiral metal surfaces. The investigation is focused on naturally chiral surfaces formed from high Miller index planes of metals such as Cu and Pt. The chirality of these surfaces arises from the kink-step-terrace structures that are formed by the intersections of three low Miller index microfacets. In this sense this type of surface chirality is distinct from the chirality imparted by the traditional approach of templating a surface with chiral ligands. Past work has probed the structure of naturally chiral surfaces, enantiospecific adsorbate geometries, and enantiospecific surface reaction energetics. These properties of chiral surfaces determine the enantioselectivities of catalytic reactions and chromatographic separations. The work proposed focuses on the exploration of naturally chiral surfaces of various structures using a combination of experimental and theoretical methods. Although there are an infinite number of chiral high Miller index surfaces, they are composed of a finite number of types of kink-step-terrace structures. The proposed investigation will explore the enantiospecificity of this set of structures on Cu single crystal surfaces by using chiral adsorbates that have previously exhibited enantiospecific surface chemistry. The educational activities are expected to be the traditional mentoring of graduate students. The fundamental goal of the proposed work is to provide a basic understanding of the roots of enantioselectivity on a set of highly characterized, naturally chiral surfaces.