This year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry will be awarded to Japanese Susumu Kitagawa, British Richard Robson and American-Jordanian Omar Yaghi. They receive the prize for their discovery and development of a chemical structure that can, among other things, capture CO2, the committee announced on Wednesday.
The structure is a so-called metal-organic framework, where there is room for various gases and chemicals to move. The chemical structure can be used for a wide range of things, the motivation reads.
- These structures can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyze chemical reactions.
British Richard Robson discovered the chemical structure in a series of experiments in 1989. At that time, however, the structure was unstable and collapsed quickly.
Susumu Kitagawa and Omar Yaghi have since helped to make the chemical structure stable in their research - a structure with great potential, the committee says.
- It has enormous potential and brings previously unforeseen opportunities for specially manufactured materials, says Heiner Linke, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry.
In addition to capturing CO2, storing toxic gases and extracting water from desert air, the structure has also contributed to separating the substance PFAS from water.
The prize comes with a prize money of 11 million Swedish kronor, equivalent to 7.5 million Danish kronor. The three researchers will share the prize equally, according to the Nobel Prize website. The prize will be presented on December 10, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death, in Stockholm.
Two Danes have received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Danish chemist Morten Meldal received the prize in 2022 for his development of the so-called click chemistry. Jens Christian Skou received the prize in 1997 for the discovery of the sodium-potassium pump. The Nobel Prizes have been awarded since 1901.
/ritzau/
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