Nobel Prize in chemistry: two researchers rewarded for the development of “asymmetric organocatalysis”, qu – franceinfo

Like the physics prize the day before, the Nobel Prize in chemistry rewarded researchers involved in the ecological turn on Wednesday, October 6. The winners, the German Benjamin List and the American David McMillan, are honored “for their development of asymmetric organocatalysis”. This “new tool for molecular construction” had “a major impact on pharmaceutical research” and “made chemistry greener”, explains the committee.

BREAKING NEWS:
The 2021 #NobelPrize in Chemistry has been awarded to Benjamin List and David WC MacMillan “for the development of asymmetric organocatalysis.” pic.twitter.com/SzTJ2Chtge

– The Nobel Prize (@NobelPrize) October 6, 2021

The two researchers, both 53 years old, were awarded for having developed asymmetric catalysis in 2000, a revolutionary new type of catalyst that has developed “at a prodigious speed” since then, explained the Nobel jury.

“It’s a huge surprise”, reacted the German laureate, contacted by telephone by the Nobel Foundation. “I thought someone was playing a joke on me. I was having breakfast with my wife. Usually she said : ‘Check your phone if someone calls from Sweden’. But today she didn’t joke “, said the researcher from the Max-Planck Institute, based in the Ruhr area.

“And when Sweden does appear on the phone (…) it’s a very special moment that I will never forget”, confided the scientist.