G-quadruplex DNA (G4-DNA) structures are four-stranded helical DNA (or RNA) structures, comprising stacks of G-tetrads, which are the outcome of planar association of four guanines in a cyclic Hoogsteen hydrogen-bonding arrangement. In the last decade the number of publications where CD spectroscopy has been used to study G4-DNAs, is extremely high. However, with very few exceptions, these investigations use an empirical interpretation of CD spectra. In this interpretation two basic types of CD spectra have been associated to a single specific difference in the features of the strand folding, i.e. the relative orientation of the strands, “parallel” (all strands have the same 5′ to 3′ orientation) or “antiparallel”. Different examples taken from the literature where the empirical interpretation is not followed or is meaningless are presented and discussed. Furthermore, the case of quadruplexes formed by monomeric guanosine derivatives, where there is no strand connecting the adjacent quartets and the definition parallel/antiparallel strands cannot apply, will be discussed. The different spectral features observed for different G-quadruplexes is rationalised in terms of chromophores responsible for the electronic transitions. A simplified exciton coupling approach or more refined QM calculations allow to interpret the different CD features in terms of different stacking orientation (head-to-tail, head-to-head, tail-to-tail) between adjacent G-quartets irrespectively of the relative orientation of the stands (parallel/antiparallel).

When a chiral dopant is dissolved in an achiral liquid crystal medium, the whole sample organizes into a helical structure with a characteristic length-scale of the order of microns. The relation between chirality at these quite different length-scales can be rationalized by a relatively simple model, which retains the relevant factors coming into play: the molecular shape of the chiral dopant, which controls the chirality of short range intermolecular interactions, and the elastic properties of the nematic environment, which control the restoring torques opposing distortion of the director. In this tutorial review the relation between molecular and phase chirality will be reviewed and several applications of the chiral doping of nematic LCs will be discussed. These range from the exploitation of the amplified molecular chirality for stereochemical purposes (e.g., the determination of the absolute configuration or the enantiomeric excess), to newer applications in physico–chemical fields. The latter take advantage of the periodicity of the chiral field, with length-scales ranging from hundreds to thousands of nanometres, which characterise the cholesteric phase.