The World's First "Pastarimeter": An Analogous Demonstration of Polarimetry Using Pasta Fusilli

Chirality, molecular left- and right-handedness, is an appealing topic for chemists to introduce to the general public. Here we describe the invention of the Pastarimeter, a novel instrument that is capable of distinguishing between left-handed and right-handed twisted pasta fusilli. When water is poured down a tube containing the pasta the right-handed fusilli rotates the water clockwise and the left-handed fusilli rotates it counterclockwise. This is analogous to the way in which polarized light is rotated by left- and right-handed molecules in a polarimeter.