Local and Global Chirality Measures of Natural Amino Acids

Abstract

The electron density cloud of each molecule contains the complete information about the molecule, including information about potential chirality effects, and in the case of a molecule undergoing a conformational or reaction process, also on chirality changes. In chemical reactions, including racemization processes of chiral amino acids, such as Aspartic Acid, the local and global electron density clouds undergo different degrees of shape changes, providing important information, wich can be monitored and studied by the tools of mathematical chemistry and computational quantum chemistry. Based on this background, two specific studies have been initiated: Study 1. Demonstration that neither the complete, global electron density cloud, nor any of the local ranges of this electron density cloud can ever become achiral in any actual L to D transformation of amino acids, including the specific case of Aspartic Acid in the in vivo conditions of the human eye, where such L to D chirality changes have been implicated as causing cataract. Study 2. Finding correlations between the gradually increasing size of well-defined chiral surroundings and the surroundings-induced chirality effects on inherently achiral molecules.