title: Modeling spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking and deracemization phenomena: discrete versus continuum approaches.
abstract: We derive the class of population balance equations (PBE), recently applied to model the Viedma deracemization experiment, from an underlying microreversible kinetic reaction scheme. The continuum limit establishing the relationship between the micro- and macroscopic processes and the associated particle fluxes erases the microreversible nature of the molecular interactions in the population growth rate functions and limits the scope of such PBE models to strict kinetic control. The irreversible binary agglomeration processes modeled in those PBEs contribute an additional source of kinetic control. These limitations are crucial regarding the question of the origin of biological homochirality, where the interest in any model lies precisely in its ability for absolute asymmetric synthesis and the amplification of the tiny inherent statistical chiral fluctuations about the ideal racemic composition up to observable enantiometric excess levels.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106-9510, USA.
authors.forename: Celia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Blanco
authors.affiliation: Department of Organic Chemistry, and Institute of Cosmos Science (IEEC-UB), University of Barcelona, c. Martí i Franquès 1, 08028 Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain.
authors.forename: Josep M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Ribó
authors.affiliation: Centro de Astrobiología (CSIC-INTA), Carretera Ajalvir Kilómetro 4, 28850 Torrejón de Ardoz, Madrid, Spain.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Hochberg
mesh_terms: D003198:Computer Simulation; D007700:Kinetics; D008956:Models, Chemical; D013816:Thermodynamics