Scientists figured out how to grow 'lefty' or 'righty' crystals just by using the texture of the surface they're on.
March 26, 2026
Original Paper
Chiral Epitaxy: Enantioselective Growth of Chiral Nanowires on Low-Symmetry Two-Dimensional Materials
arXiv · 2603.24565
The Takeaway
Many essential molecules for life have a specific 'handedness' (chirality), but forcing solid materials to grow that way usually requires messy chemical additives. This discovery shows that a material's orientation can be dictated purely by the geometry of the surface it grows on, offering a clean new way to build quantum components.
From the abstract
Chiral crystals exhibit useful handedness-dependent properties, including spin selectivity and circularly polarized light sensitivity, yet controlling which enantiomer forms during synthesis remains a central challenge. Existing approaches utilize molecules in solution to template crystal growth, which restricts processing conditions and introduces organic contaminants incompatible with device fabrication. Enantioselective growth of a chiral crystal on a chiral surface via vapor-phase synthesis