Chiral-vibration-induced magnetism and circular dichroism in organic molecules
Abstract
We investigate the vibrational inverse Faraday effect and transient vibrational circular dichroism in benzene, coronene, and methane at the single-molecule level. We combine density-functional tight-binding calculations with damped normal-mode dynamics. Circularly polarized light excites suitable degenerate infrared-active modes, driving chiral nuclear motion that produces effective magnetic moments. Reversing the pump helicity reverses the vibrational chirality and the sign of the transient dichroic response. These results support a writing-readout scheme in which circularly polarized pumping prepares a chiral vibrational state and transient vibrational circular dichroism probes its handedness. We further examine how molecular symmetry shapes the light-induced chiral response across the three molecular systems. This work provides a valuable platform for exploring all-optical control of magnetism and chiroptical probing at the molecular scale.
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BibTeX
@misc{xu2026chiralvibrationinduced,
title = {{Chiral-vibration-induced magnetism and circular dichroism in organic molecules}},
author = {Hao-Wen Xu and Cheng Xu and Zi-Yang Xu and Xiao-Long Yang and Hang Xie},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = nov,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2611.07511},
eprint = {2611.07511},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.07511},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Chiral-vibration-induced magnetism and circular dichroism in organic molecules
AU - Hao-Wen Xu
AU - Cheng Xu
AU - Zi-Yang Xu
AU - Xiao-Long Yang
AU - Hang Xie
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/11/05
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2611.07511
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2611.07511
AB - We investigate the vibrational inverse Faraday effect and transient vibrational circular dichroism in benzene, coronene, and methane at the single-molecule level. We combine density-functional tight-binding calculations with damped normal-mode dynamics. Circularly polarized light excites suitable degenerate infrared-active modes, driving chiral nuclear motion that produces effective magnetic moments. Reversing the pump helicity reverses the vibrational chirality and the sign of the transient dichroic response. These results support a writing-readout scheme in which circularly polarized pumping prepares a chiral vibrational state and transient vibrational circular dichroism probes its handedness. We further examine how molecular symmetry shapes the light-induced chiral response across the three molecular systems. This work provides a valuable platform for exploring all-optical control of magnetism and chiroptical probing at the molecular scale.
ER -