Advanced Chirality
Chemistry
Level
3
Which of the following are chiral in nature?
A) An electron, B) 1,3-dimethylallene, C) cyclooctene, D) methylene chloride (dichloromethane).
A, B & C.
B & D
B & C
B, C & D.
C & D
This section requires Javascript.
You are seeing this because something didn't load right. We suggest you, (a) try
refreshing the page, (b) enabling javascript if it is disabled on your browser and,
finally, (c)
loading the
non-javascript version of this page
. We're sorry about the hassle.
1 solution
. An electron displays both spin and angular momentum. Depending upon the direction of these alignment of these properties, an electron can either be right handed, or left handed. One occurs when both the spin and angular momentum are aligned in the same direction, and the other when they are in opposing directions.
. 1,3-dimethylallene displays axial chirality, and has two stereoisomers (shown below).
. cyclooctene is an example of planar chirality, whereby the polymethylene bridge can either go "in front of" or go "behind" the plane of the double bond (see below). A high-energy barrier between the two enantiomers prevents the racemization under standard conditions.
. methylene chloride is achiral, as it has two planes of symmetry.