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Stockholm, Oct.6: The Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to German scientist Benjamin List and Scottish-born scientist David MacMillan for their development of asymmetric organocatalysis, a “new and ingenious tool for molecule building”.
BREAKING NEWS:
The 2021 #NobelPrize in Chemistry has been awarded to Benjamin List and David W.C. MacMillan “for the development of asymmetric organocatalysis.” pic.twitter.com/SzTJ2Chtge— The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 6, 2021
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awards the more than century-old prize, which is worth 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.14 million).
The academy in a statement said,“Organic catalysts can be used to drive multitudes of chemical reactions. Using these reactions, researchers can now more efficiently construct anything from new pharmaceuticals to molecules that can capture light in solar cells.”
It also said that these catalysts were both environmentally friendly and cheap to produce.
The chemistry prize is the third of this year’s Nobel Prizes, following the announcements of the prizes for medicine or physiology and physics earlier this week.
Marie Curie and Fredrick Sanger, who both received the prize twice, are previous winners of the Chemistry prize.
Till date 7 women have been awarded this prestigious prize including last year’s laureates Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna who were awarded the prize for producing genetic “scissors” that can edit DNA.