Propelling single molecules in a controlled manner along an unmodified surface remains extremely challenging because it requires molecules that can use light, chemical or electrical energy to modulate their interaction with the surface in a way that generates motion. Nature's motor proteins have mastered the art of converting conformational changes into directed motion, and have inspired the design of artificial systems such as DNA walkers and light- and redox-driven molecular motors. But although controlled movement of single molecules along a surface has been reported, the molecules in these examples act as passive elements that either diffuse along a preferential direction with equal probability for forward and backward movement or are dragged by an STM tip. Here we present a molecule with four functional units--our previously reported rotary motors--that undergo continuous and defined conformational changes upon sequential electronic and vibrational excitation. Scanning tunnelling microscopy confirms that activation of the conformational changes of the rotors through inelastic electron tunnelling propels the molecule unidirectionally across a Cu(111) surface. The system can be adapted to follow either linear or random surface trajectories or to remain stationary, by tuning the chirality of the individual motor units. Our design provides a starting point for the exploration of more sophisticated molecular mechanical systems with directionally controlled motion.

The concept of chirality dates back to 1848, when Pasteur manually separated left-handed from right-handed sodium ammonium tartrate crystals. Crystallization is still an important means for separating chiral molecules into their two different mirror-image isomers (enantiomers), yet remains poorly understood. For example, there are no firm rules to predict whether a particular pair of chiral partners will follow the behaviour of the vast majority of chiral molecules and crystallize together as racemic crystals, or as separate enantiomers. A somewhat simpler and more tractable version of this phenomenon is crystallization in two dimensions, such as the formation of surface structures by adsorbed molecules. The relatively simple spatial molecular arrangement of these systems makes it easier to study the effects of specific chiral interactions; moreover, chiral assembly and recognition processes can be observed directly and with molecular resolution using scanning tunnelling microscopy. The enantioseparation of chiral molecules in two dimensions is expected to occur more readily because planar confinement excludes some bulk crystal symmetry elements and enhances chiral interactions; however, many surface structures have been found to be racemic. Here we show that the chiral hydrocarbon heptahelicene on a Cu111 surface does not undergo two-dimensional spontaneous resolution into enantiomers, but still shows enantiomorphism on a mesoscopic length scale that is readily amplified. That is, we observe formation of racemic heptahelicene domains with non-superimposable mirror-like lattice structures, with a small excess of one of the heptahelicene enantiomers suppressing the formation of one domain type. Similar to the induction of homochirality in achiral enantiomorphous monolayers by a chiral modifier, a small enantiomeric excess suffices to ensure that the entire molecular monolayer consists of domains having only one of two possible, non-superimposable, mirror-like lattice structures.

Optical activity in sum-frequency vibrational spectra has been observed for the first time in chiral liquids. The electric-dipole allowed chiral element of the nonlinear susceptibility appears to be 3 orders of magnitude smaller than typical allowed achiral elements. This is partly because the observed chirality requires a breakdown of the Born-Oppenheimer approximation.

With the adsorption of larger molecules being increasingly tackled by surface scientists, the aspect of chirality often plays a role. This paper gives a topical review of molecular chirality at surfaces and gives a phenomenological overview of different aspects of adsorption and self‐assembly of chiral and prochiral molecules and the principles of mirror‐symmetry breaking at a surface. After a brief introduction into the history of molecular chirality and the important role it played for understanding the spatial structure of molecules, definitions of chirality are presented. Topics treated here are principle ways to create single chiral adsorbates, chiral ensembles, and monolayers by achiral molecules, adsorption of intrinsically chiral molecules at achiral and chiral surfaces, long‐range symmetry breaking in two‐dimensional (2D) crystals due to additional chiral bias, chiral restructuring of solid surfaces under the influence of chiral molecules, switching the handedness of adsorbates, and chirality at the liquid/air interface. An outlook onto further potential research directions and recommendations for further reading, including nonsurface‐related sources of chiral topics completes this paper.

The interaction of low-energy photoelectrons with well-ordered monolayers of enantiopure helical heptahelicene molecules adsorbed on metal surfaces leads to a preferential transmission of one longitudinally polarized spin component, which is strongly coupled to the helical sense of the molecules. Heptahelicene, composed of only carbon and hydrogen atoms, exhibits only a single helical turn but shows excess in longitudinal spin polarization of about P = 6 to 8% after transmission of initially balanced left- and right-handed spin polarized electrons. Insight into the electronic structure, that is, the projected density of states, and the spin-dependent electron scattering in the helicene molecule is gained by using spin-resolved density functional theory calculations and a model Hamiltonian approach, respectively. Our results support the semiclassical picture of electronic transport along a helical pathway under the influence of spin-orbit coupling induced by the electrostatic molecular potential.

Chemie CommunicationsChirality transfer from single molecules into handed supramolecular structures is studied by self-assembly of chiral molecules on solid surfaces. Each "mountain" in the STM image represents a single M heptahelicene molecule on a Cu(111) surface. The P enantiomer forms the mirror-image structure. For more information see the following Communication by Fasel, Ernst, and Parschau.

Mastering supramolecular self-assembly to a similar degree as nature has achieved on a subcellular scale is critical for the efficient fabrication of complex nanoscopic and mesoscopic structures. We demonstrate that active, molecular-scale transport powered by biomolecular motors can be utilized to drive the self-assembly of mesoscopic structures that would not form in the absence of active transport. In the presented example, functionalized microtubules transported by surface-immobilized kinesin motors cross-link via biotin/streptavidin bonds and form extended linear and circular mesoscopic structures, which move in the presence of ATP. The self-assembled structures are oriented, exhibit large internal strains, and are metastable while the biomolecular motors are active. The integration of molecular motors into the self-assembly process overcomes the trade-off between stability and complexity in thermally activated molecular self-assembly.

The chiral recognition among biomolecules is fundamentally important for many processes of life, including the stereochemistry of evolution. Of special interest is chiral recognition during crystallization of racemates, when either homochiral recognition leads to a conglomerate of homochiral crystals or heterochiral recognition dominates resulting in a racemic compound. The complex nature of molecular recognition at the level of nucleation and crystal growth renders it difficult to understand and calls for manageable model systems. Notably, the approach of studying aggregation of molecules at surfaces under well-defined conditions includes the benefit of the availability of a multitude of highly sensitive investigation methods, of which scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) with its submolecular resolution is tremendously valuable. Heterogeneous nucleation at surfaces is strongly favored over homogeneous nucleation in solution; hence, surfaces are significantly involved in stereochemical recognition during crystallization. Helicenes are a fascinating class of chiral compounds with outstanding optical activity. These π-conjugated, ortho-fused, aromatic hydrocarbons are promising candidates for organic electronic devices such as sensors, circular dichroic photonics, liquid crystal displays or spin filters. But in particular the defined footprint of their terminal benzo rings on a surface makes them interesting for studying stereochemical recognition with different single crystalline surfaces and the impact this has, in turn, on intermolecular recognition. In this Account, we describe the self-assembly of helicenes on metal surfaces with the focus on stereochemical recognition in two-dimensional structures. Using the isomeric all-carbon helicenes, heptahelicene and dibenzohelicene as examples, different aggregation phenomena on different surfaces of single crystalline copper, silver, and gold are investigated. By means of STM different modes of transmission of molecular handedness from single molecules into extended two-dimensional supramolecular structures are identified. For the problem of racemate versus conglomerate crystallization, the impact of surface and molecular structure and their interplay are analyzed. This leads to detailed conclusions about the importance of the match of molecular and surface binding sites for long-range self-assembly. The absence of polar groups puts emphasis on van der Waals interaction and their maximization by steric overlap of molecular parts in enantiomeric and diastereomeric interactions. With STM as a manipulation tool, dimers are manually separated in order to analyze their chiral composition. And finally, new nonlinear cooperative effects induced by small enantiospecific bias are discovered that lead to single enantiomorphism in two-dimensional racemate crystals as well as in racemic multilayered films. By means of these model studies many details that govern chiral recognition at surfaces are rationalized.