Mechanical strain creates chirality

6 hours ago

Mechanical strain can induce chirality in non-chiral crystals, allowing on-demand control of handedness.
Tensile and compressive strain produce opposite handedness, and the effect is reversible.
The phenomenon, termed the piezochiral effect, was demonstrated experimentally and supported by a theoretical framework.
An open-access database of candidate piezochiral crystals has been created at piezochiral.org.
This discovery enables new strategies for engineering chiral properties in materials, such as superconductivity.

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The discovery of the 'hat' tile in March 2023 solved a long-standing problem of forced aperiodicity with a single shape, but it required both handednesses (reflections).
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