If there is a mirror molecule, why can't you just flip it?

If there is a mirror molecule, why can't you just flip it?

Try it I dare you

it may appear flat on a piece of paper, but the molecule actually takes on a 3D shape. Flipping a molecule would not make it the same thing as its enantiomer because the constituent atoms would be pointing in different directions.

Because a rotation is not a reflection.

Flip it , and the NH3 is now sticking out on the far side of the molecule instead of sticking out toward you.

Scanned from a book I just read, "Revelation Through Science." Think it illustrates the "handedness" of molecules, and why rotation does not change that, pretty well.

Pretty good illustration

Try it with your hands my dude.

Oh shit are those ISIS molecules?

> what is chirality

>Tfw got a 27%, 7%, 22%, 14% (final) on all my ochem tests and still got a B in the class

OP needs walter white to explain it to him

If chirality is giving you trouble, I highly recommend getting a molecule building set, or make one with colored Plasticine and toothpicks.

But to answer your question, the molecule cannot be flipped because this would actually be a different molecule. Remember, molecules do not function on mere atomic makeup, but due to the orientation of those atoms in 3D space. If you were to flip the alanine molecule on the left, the substituents would be occupying different areas in space relative to where they began, but the orientation of each would still be the same.

Comparatively, both amine substituents occupy the same area in 3D space, but the methyl and carboxylate substituents are on opposite sides of each alanine molecule. Therefore, each molecule has two substituents occupying opposite areas in space, and are different. Hope that helps.

Referring to them as "mirror images" is a horrible misinterpretation because most molecules don't exist in 2D space

>Tfw got an 80%, 78% and 75% on midterm 1, 2 and final respectively in Ochem 2
>averages were 27%, 40%, 52% respectively
>Tfw basically got a Super A

Neither do you. Yet you have a mirror image. Fascinating.

I fucking wish my professor curved
Fuck orgo and fuck cuny

Just try. That's like holding something in your right hand, flip, and somehow having your right rand become your left hand. It's retarded.
Worse case buy molecular model kit, or download 3d visualization tools for free.

there was some medicine for morning sickness or something. they gave it to women. seemed to work great. but then, lots of horrible misbirths. turns out the factory had made the opposite chirality. it was a right handed instead of left handed molecule. same atoms. same bonds. different direction.

crazy shit.

how can chirality be real if mirrors arent real

Because they're chiral. They look like they're just flipped over on paper, but it's not the case in reality because they're 3 dimensional objects.

For example, your right hand, when flipped over, does not become a mirror image (your left hand). It's just a rotated version of your right hand.

However, you can flip between two mirror images, and occasionally it happens by itself (see: thalidomide, which will spontaneously do this and cause birth defects) so it's not like it's impossible.

because of this you mong

Thalidomide i believe, pretty gruesome births as a result

...

pathetic

Doesn't matter which one they give you, it racemizes in the body.