Stockholm (d.de) – This year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry will go to the materials scientists Susumu Kitagawa (Japan), Richard Robson (Australia) and Omar Yaghi (USA) for their development of metal-organic frameworks. Kitagawa and Yaghi were supported in their research by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and both received the Humboldt Research Award, enabling them to pursue research in Germany.
“We warmly congratulate Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi. They highly deserve this award for their groundbreaking work. We are all the more pleased given that two of them, Susumu Kitagawa and Omar M. Yaghi, are Humboldtians who cultivate close ties to the Humboldt Foundation and to Germany,” said Robert Schlögl, president of the Humboldt Foundation.
The researchers have succeeded in creating molecular constructions with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow. These spongy networks can be used in a variety of ways: for example to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyse chemical reactions.
Each year, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation enables over 2,000 researchers from all over the world to spend a period of time pursuing scientific study in Germany. It maintains an interdisciplinary network of more than 30,000 fellows – including 63 Nobel laureates – in more than 140 countries worldwide.
