Three Share Nobel Prize In Chemistry For Metal-Organic Frameworks

Three scientists were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry “for the development of metal-organic frameworks.”

Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi will share the 11 million-krona ($1.2 million) award, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm said in a statement Wednesday.

The laureates created molecular constructions with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow, the Committee said. “These constructions, metal-organic frameworks, can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyse chemical reactions.”

Annual prizes for achievements in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature and peace were established in the will of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite, who died in 1896. A prize in economic sciences was added by Sweden’s central bank in 1968.

Last year’s chemistry Nobel was awarded to two Google DeepMind scientists, who shared the prize with a US professor for their breakthrough research into proteins. Famous discoveries to have earned the award include mapping the structure of penicillin in 1964 and the means by which plants convert carbon dioxide into carbohydrates in 1961.

The laureates are announced through Oct. 13 in Stockholm, with the exception of the Nobel Peace Prize, whose recipients are selected on Friday by the Norwegian Nobel Committee in Oslo.