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Detecting chirality in molecules by linearly polarized laser fields

Yachmenev, A; Yurchenko, SN; (2016) Detecting chirality in molecules by linearly polarized laser fields. Physical Review Letters , 117 (03) , Article 033001. 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.033001. Green open access

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Abstract

A new scheme for enantiomer differentiation of chiral molecules using a pair of linearly polarized intense ultrashort laser pulses with skewed mutual polarization is presented. The technique relies on the fact that the off-diagonal anisotropic contributions to the electric polarizability tensor for two enantiomers have different signs. Exploiting this property, we are able to excite a coherent unidirectional rotation of two enantiomers with a \pi phase difference in the molecular electric dipole moment. The approach is robust and suitable for relatively high temperatures of molecular samples, making it applicable for selective chiral analysis of mixtures, and to chiral molecules with low barriers between enantiomers. As an illustration, we present nanosecond laser-driven dynamics of a tetratomic non-rigid chiral molecule with short-lived chirality. The ultrafast time scale of the proposed technique is well suited to study parity violation in molecular systems in short-lived chiral states.

Type: Article
Title: Detecting chirality in molecules by linearly polarized laser fields
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.033001
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.117.033001
Language: English
Additional information: This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI. Copyright © 2016 American Physical Society.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Physics and Astronomy
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1493230
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