Project A9

Project Lead: Marcel Mudrich (University of Kassel)

A new approach to investigating chirality of molecules in defined environments – photoelectron circular dichroism (PECD) of chiral species embedded in superfluid helium nanodroplets – will be explored. A series of extreme ultraviolet synchrotron experiments will be carried out to scrutinize this approach for a varying size of the He shell surrounding the molecule as the main control parameter, ranging from a few He atoms up to tens of nanometers. This approach exploits the unique properties of helium nanodroplets – ultralow temperature, weak interaction with embedded species, efficient pick up of molecules and controlled aggregation inside the nanodroplets – and thus opens up a new class of experimental studies of fragile chiral species such as amino acids and their clusters and hetero-complexes.