Development of a reliable, efficient and economic chiral drug separation process

手性是现代制药、食品和农业工业中的主要关注点。手性药物的销售接近全球所有药物销售的三分之一。用于手性药物的普通化学生产方法生产包含具有相同化学组成但空间结构取向不同的对映异构体的外消旋混合物。很常见的是发现一种异构体形式对人体具有治疗作用，而其对映体是有害的或无效的。因此，分离两种对映体对于提高药物的安全性和耐受性有明显的好处。近年来，由于FDA新的法规要求手性药物尽可能纯，含有单一纯对映体，手性纯药物的重要性急剧上升。

Chirality is a major concern in the modern pharmaceutical, food and agricultural industries. The sale of chiral drugs is close to one-third of all drug sales worldwide. Ordinary chemical production methods for chiral drugs produce a racemic mixture containing enantiomers having identical chemical compositions but different structural orientations in space. It is quite common to find that one isomeric form has a therapeutic effect on the human body while its enantiomer is harmful or ineffective. Hence, there is obvious benefit from separating the two enantiomers to enhance drug's safety and tolerability. The importance of chirally pure drugs has risen dramatically in recent years due to new FDA regulations requiring that chiral drugs be as pure as possible containing a single pure enantiomer.