Enzymes are inherently chiral catalysts — their active sites are asymmetric, enabling them to discriminate between enantiomers with very high selectivity (often >99% ee). This is critical for pharmaceuticals where one enantiomer is therapeutic and the other is toxic or inactive (e.g. ibuprofen, thalidomide). Enzymatic chiral resolution or asymmetric synthesis operates under mild conditions (room temperature, aqueous media, neutral pH), avoiding harsh chemicals and racemic mixtures.