The Thalidomide Paradox
Synopsis The thalidomide tragedy is one of the most infamous episodes in pharmaceutical history—yet its stereochemical secrets are still being unraveled. A fascinating article by Tokunaga E, Yamamoto T, Ito E, and Shibata N., published in Scientific Reports (Nature Research, 2018; https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-35457-6), sheds new light on the phenomenon through the lens of the self-disproportionation of enantiomers, the physical chemistry of chirality. Thalidomide’s tragic past is linked to its two “mirror-image” forms. One form, the S-enantiomer, …