Do meso compounds need to have chiral centers?

[IcemanMD]

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Reading some contradictory things on wikipedia:

"despite containing two or more stereocenters (chiral centers) it is not chiral....


A meso compound need not even have a chiral center."

I thought the requirements for a meso compound were opposing chiral centers and a plane of symmetry.

 

[chemtopper]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meso_compound
check this link

 

[Lifeman]

Yes, a meso compound has to have stereocenters. Otherwise it wouldn't be classified as meso, but just "identical". So you could say that meso is a subclass of being identical.

 

[Lifeman]

del