2 scientists win Nobel Prize in chemistry for new way of building molecules

Two scientists have won the Nobel Prize in chemistry for developing "an ingenious tool for building molecules" that is also cheap and environmentally-friendly, Report informs referring to NPR.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced Wednesday that the award would be shared by Benjamin List of the Max Planck Institute for Coal Research in Germany, and David MacMillan, at Princeton University in the United States.

About twenty years ago, the two independently pioneered the development of a new kind of catalyst, a substance that can drive a chemical reaction.

Traditionally, chemists have used enzymes or metal catalysts. But these two researchers figured out that small, organic molecules can be used to drive all kinds of chemical reactions. MacMillan coined the term "organocatalysis" to describe the new concept.

The Nobel committee noted that organocatalysis is especially useful when researchers want to make a molecule and selectively produce one of its two mirror images, which is called asymmetric organocatalysis. This has proven to be particularly important for pharmaceuticals.