Stardust, supernovae, neutrinos and the chirality of the amino acids

A mechanism for creating amino acid enantiomerism that involves selection of one chirality by interactions with the neutrinos from a core-collapse supernova is defined. This selection mechanism involves the alignment between the spins of the neutrinos and of the ¹⁴N nuclei in the amino acids, or in precursor molecules, which in turn couple to the molecular chirality. Details of the chiral selection, as well as the subsequent chemical evolution and galactic mixing that would ultimately populate the Galaxy with the selected species are discussed. The resulting amino acids could either be the source thereof on Earth or could have produced the chirality that was ultimately achieved for Earthly amino acids.