The zwitterionic form of aqueous L-alanine is chosen as a benchmark for the theoretical evaluation of the optical rotatory dispersion (ORD) in solution, as provided by a simple application of the perturbed matrix method (PMM). Results show the applicability of this procedure, suggesting that its use might provide a general theoretical-computational tool for describing, at atomic-molecular level, the optical activity of a molecule in a complex environment. (C) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.