French chemist Henri Kagan and Japanese researcher Kenso Soai awarded 2023 Nobel Chemistry Prize for uncovering origins of molecular homochirality

French chemist Henri Kagan and Japanese researcher Kenso Soai were awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Chemistry on Wednesday for solving the long‑standing puzzle of why only one mirror‑image form of certain molecules predominates in nature—a breakthrough that has profound implications for drug development.

The Nobel Committee honored them for their discovery of non‑linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis.

Much like left and right hands, amino acids exist as two mirror‑image variants, yet only one of these forms is present in the proteins that make up living cells.

The scarcity of the opposite form in nature is termed ‘homochirality’, a phenomenon explained by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

For decades chemists have sought to understand how this uniform handedness arises; the laureates’ work has shown how to steer chemical reactions toward producing homochiral products.

“Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai have cracked a chemical mystery that has persisted for over a century: how homochirality can emerge spontaneously. The reactions they devised are truly spectacular,” said Heiner Linke, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry.

“Their findings have been pivotal for chemists designing reactions used to manufacture pharmaceuticals,” the jury added.

The Nobel Prize includes a diploma, a gold medal, and a cash award of 12 million Swedish kronor (approximately $1.2 million), which is divided equally among multiple laureates in the same category.

The laureates will receive their awards at a formal ceremony on December 10, marking the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death in 1896, the founder of the prizes.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)

Source link