Chirality at surfaces has become a strong focus within the surface science community. A particular motivation is the prospect of using heterogeneous catalysis over chiral solid surfaces for asymmetric synthesis, a prospect which has clear relevance to the pharmaceutical industry. Small amino acids adsorbed on Cu surfaces have emerged as important model systems for studying the interaction of chiral molecules with metal surfaces. In this article, we review the current state of knowledge of these systems, and present the results of new experimental studies of alanine overlayers on Cu{311} and {531} surfaces. Our work on Cu{311} helps us to understand the interplay between different manifestations of chirality, especially ''footprint chirality'', in the overlayers. Cu{531} is an intrinsically chiral surface orientation; our data reveal strongly enantiospecific alanine-induced restructuring of this surface. This points the way towards a promising route for obtaining strongly enantiospecific interactions with chiral adsorbates.

Intrinsically chiral metal surfaces would potentially offer a route toward enantioselective heterogeneous catalysis. A bulk-terminated {531} surface of an fcc metal has an intrinsically chiral unit mesh: it thus appears to be an attractive candidate for fundamental studies of the interaction of such an intrinsically chiral metal surface with chiral adsorbates. Using atomically resolved scanning tunnelling microscopy at 77 K, we show that the real Cu{531} surface departs strongly from ideal bulk termination, exhibiting a high degree of atomic-scale roughness. We examine the impact of the roughness on the low-energy electron diffraction pattern, discuss the origins and nature of the roughness in the context of thermal roughening, and comment upon the implications of the roughness for adsorption of chiral molecules.