On Wednesday, three scientists won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for developing a method of design molecular structures whose multiple uses include the fight against climate change by capturing carbon dioxide and harvesting water from the desert.
Japan Susumu Kitagawa, born in Richard Robson and Omar Yaghi American-Jordanian, was honored for their revolutionary discoveries dating from the late 1980s to the early 2000s.
Thanks to the discoveries of the trio, said that the jury, the chemists, had been able to build tens of thousands of so-called metal-organic frames (MOF).
“Some of them can help resolve some of the biggest challenges in humanity,” he added.
He listed applications such as “the separation of water PFAS, the decomposition of traces of pharmaceutical products in the environment, the capture of carbon dioxide or the harvesting of the desert air water”.
Revolutionary discoveries
In 1989, Robson, 88, tested using the properties of atoms in a new way using copper ions.
“When they were combined, they got linked to form a spacious and well -ordered crystal,” said the jury. “It was like a diamond filled with countless cavities.”
While Robson, professor at the University of Melbourne, achieved the potential of its discovery that molecular construction was unstable.
It was Kitagawa, professor at the University of Kyoto, and Yaghi, professor at the University of California in Berkeley, who provided an appropriate base for the construction method.
Between 1992 and 2003, working separately, they made a series of revolutionary discoveries.
Kitagawa “has shown that gases can circulate in and outside the constructions and predict that MOFs could be flexible,” said the jury.
Yaghi created “a very stable MOF” and showed that it could be changed using a rational design, which gives it new and desirable properties, “he added.
‘Like a sponge’
Reacting to the price, specialists in the field have agreed with the importance of the work.
For Dorothy J. Phillips, president of the American Chemical Society, the most exciting application was the capture of carbon dioxide.
“We are in the middle of climate change, we really want to do things like the track and reduce carbon dioxide … This is a great application,” she told AFP.
Ross Forgan, professor of chemistry of materials at the University of Glasgow, told AFP that MOFs could be described as “solid holes”.
“They have a ridiculously high storage capacity in them because they are hollow, and they can absorb other molecules such as a sponge,” said Forgan.
David Fauren-Jimenez, a teacher who studies MOF at the University of Cambridge, explained that they could also be assembled to make new functional materials.
“It is very easy to imagine as a molecular construction game,” he added, making a comparison with “playing with Lego”.
‘A whole trip’
In an interview with the Nobel Foundation, Yaghi said that he was “amazed, delighted, outdated” to learn that he had won the prize.
He was at an airport to change theft when the academy called him to announce the news.
Yaghi was born into a family of Palestinian refugees in Amman, Jordan.
“I grew up in a very humble house,” he said. “And, you know, we were a dozen of us in a small room, by sharing it with the cattle that we used.”
The school provided a refuge in Yaghi, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in its press release. He moved to the United States to study at the age of 15.
“So it’s a whole trip,” he said-and science had allowed him to do so, “he added.
“Science is the greatest equalization force in the world,” said Yaghi.
A diploma, a medal and a check
The price of chemistry follows the price of physics, which honored British on Tuesday John Clarke, the Frenchman Michel Devoret and the American John Martinis for the work put into action the theory of quantum mechanics.
On Monday, the Nobel Prize in Medicine went to Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell, the United States, and Shimon Sakaguchi in Japan for research on the human immune system.
The Nobel Prize for Literature will be announced Thursday, followed by the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday.
The Economy Prize ended the Nobel 2025 season on October 13.
The Nobel consists of a diploma, a gold medal and a check of $ 1.2 million, to be shared if there is more than one winner in a discipline.
