My review of the book
The origin of chirality in the molecules of life
By Albert Guijarro and Miguel Yus
RSC Publishing 2009
ISBN 978-0-85404-156-5
has now appeared in Chemistry & Industry, issue 9, p. 30. Here's a snippet:
Albert Guijarro and Miguel Yus describe the chirality problem and our current best guesses at its solution very systematically in their book. They start from first principles with the physics of time and space and precise physical definitions of symmetry and asymmetry. They very usefully split the problem into two fundamental aspects: symmetry-breaking events, and mechanisms that could amplify existing imbalance between enantiomers.
Readers who aren't very good at (or keen on) theoretical physics may find
Uwe Meierhenrich: Amino Acids and the Asymmetry of Life: Caught in the Act of Formation, Springer 2008
a bit more accessible.
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