Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

12-2000

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Physics

Major Professor

Robert N. Compton

Committee Members

Robert Hinde, Marianne Breinig, Jon Levin

Abstract

A consequence of the chiral weak interaction is that the enantiomers of a chiral molecule will differ in energy by the minute parity-violating energy difference (PVED). The enantiomers of a chiral iron complex were prepared and characterized with various spectroscopies, including x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and x-ray diffraction. Measurements of the Mossbauer spectra show a small difference in the energy of the two enantiomers (~10-10 eV). This energy difference nears the expected order of magnitude of the parity-violating energy difference for a molecule in which the chiral center is a high Z atom. Sodium chlorate has been known to form chiral crystals from achiral aqueous solutions for over one hundred years. Typically, equal numbers of right- and left-handed crystals are produced in unstirred crystallizations. Data has been taken that show an excess of right-handed crystals are produced when crystallizations occur under the influence of a beta source. The beta particles are spin polarized due to the chiral weak interaction which is responsible for beta decay. Preliminary results indicate that the influence of positrons (which are spin polarized oppositely to beta particles) is in the opposite direction. Finally, measurements of mass resolved resonant and non-resonant multiphoton ionization of the chiral 2-butylamine entrained in a nozzle jet expansion into a linear time-of-flight mass spectrometer constructed in house were obtained using right- and left-circularly polarized laser light. In addition, ratios of ionization rates for linearly and circularly polarized light were measured.

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