Repository logo

Infoscience

  • English
  • French
Log In
Logo EPFL, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne

Infoscience

  • English
  • French
Log In
  1. Home
  2. Academic and Research Output
  3. Journal articles
  4. Interfacial Self-Assembly of Sugars at Nanoscale Membranes Leads to Micron-Scale, Spectroscopically Ice-Like Chiral Suprastructures of Water
 
research article

Interfacial Self-Assembly of Sugars at Nanoscale Membranes Leads to Micron-Scale, Spectroscopically Ice-Like Chiral Suprastructures of Water

Zhang, Li  
•
Liu, Jinchan
•
Voïtchovsky, Kislon
Show more
September 4, 2025
Journal of the American Chemical Society

Life requires chemical chiral specificity. The emergence of enantioselectivity is unknown but has been linked to diverse scenarios for the origin of life, ranging from an extraterrestrial origin to polarization-induced effects, and magnetic field-induced mineral templating. These scenarios require an originating mechanism and a subsequent enhancement step, leading to widespread chiral specificity. The common denominator in all scenarios is water, which provides an environment for the enantioselective process. Because water is a nonchiral molecule, it has not been considered as an active ingredient in either of these processes. Here, we show that water can form extended chiral ordered structures that are induced by interactions with simple chiral prebiotic molecules, such as lipids and sugars. Using a combination of molecular dynamics simulations, chiral-sensitive and interface-specific vibrational sum frequency scattering, second harmonic scattering, and atomic force microscopy, the interfacial structure of water on nanoscale lipid membranes was investigated. Out-of-plane H-bonding interactions between achiral liposomes and simple chiral cyclic sugars lead to ordered, spectroscopically ice-like, chiral water suprastructures that extend along the self-assembled lipid-sugar complex over distances >10 μm. Such highly ordered self-assemblies could potentially have provided microenvironments that enable the enhancement of chirality.

  • Files
  • Details
  • Metrics
Type
research article
DOI
10.1021/jacs.5c05215
Author(s)
Zhang, Li  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Liu, Jinchan
Voïtchovsky, Kislon
Rani, Chaudhary E.  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Pullanchery, Saranya  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Dedic, Jan  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Batista, Victor S.
Fantner, Georg E.  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Roke, Sylvie  

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne

Date Issued

2025-09-04

Publisher

American Chemical Society (ACS)

Published in
Journal of the American Chemical Society
Article Number

jacs.5c05215

Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
LBP  
LBNI  
FunderFunding(s)Grant NumberGrant URL

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

EP/S028234/1

Julia Jacobi Foundation

H2020 European Research Council

951324

Show more
Available on Infoscience
September 15, 2025
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/253973
Logo EPFL, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne
  • Contact
  • infoscience@epfl.ch

  • Follow us on Facebook
  • Follow us on Instagram
  • Follow us on LinkedIn
  • Follow us on X
  • Follow us on Youtube
AccessibilityLegal noticePrivacy policyCookie settingsEnd User AgreementGet helpFeedback

Infoscience is a service managed and provided by the Library and IT Services of EPFL. © EPFL, tous droits réservés