Nobel prize for chemistry awarded for new way to build useful molecules

Three scientists share the Nobel prize for chemistry after developing a technique for assembling chains of carbon atoms to make novel drugs, agrochemicals and electronic coatings
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The 2010 Nobel prize for chemistry has been awarded to three scientists who developed an efficient way to create chains of carbon atoms, a critical tool for the synthesis of complex molecules such as drugs and coatings for electronic components.

Richard Heck of the University of Delaware, Ei-ichi Negishi of Purdue University, and Akira Suzuki of Hokkaido University in Japan came up with efficient ways to link carbon atoms together. This process is important in synthesising, among other things, pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals and coatings for electronic components. The 10 million Swedish Kronor (£1m) prize will be shared equally between the three Nobel laureates.

In nature, everything from penicillin to hormones, the scent of a flower and the colour of a person's eyes is the result of carbon-based molecules. Understanding how to synthesise chains of carbon atoms has given scientists skeletons upon which to build molecules with specific functions or properties, leading to the discovery of new medicines and materials such as plastics.

Building the carbon skeletons, however, is not easy. Carbon atoms are stable and do not react easily with each other. Today's Nobel winners found ways of using palladium to catalyse reactions between carbon atoms without producing lots of unwanted by-products.

Negishi said he was sound asleep when he got the phone call from the Nobel committee. "It was around 5am here and I went to bed last night well past midnight. I was extremely happy to receive the call."

He added: "I would be telling a lie if I wasn't thinking about this. I began dreaming about this prize half a century ago, when I came to America and when I encountered several Nobel laureates coming to the University of Pennsylvania. Since then it has become my hopeful dream which I have been pursuing, [though] not as the only main goal.

"I have been telling people that my goal is half way over. I would like to keep on working for at least several more years. I would like to use the prize money to further propel my research."

Negishi said that the significance of his work was that it allowed the synthesis of any carbon-based, or organic, compound of importance. "We believe that our technology will be applicable to a very wide range of compounds without knowing what they might be ... One of our dreams is to be able to synthesise any molecules we have in mind."

David Phillips, president of the Royal Society of Chemistry, said: "The metal-based 'coupling' reactions pioneered by this year's three chemistry Nobel laureates have led to countless breakthroughs. The Heck, Negishi and Suzuki reactions make possible the vital fluorescent marking that underpins DNA sequencing, and are essential tools for synthetic chemists creating complex new drugs and polymers."

Yesterday the Nobel prize for physics was awarded to Konstantin Novoselov and Andre Geim, both at the University of Manchester, for creating wafers of carbon that are a single atom thick. Their unusual properties could transform electronics, from solar cells to computers and sensors.

On Monday, the Nobel prize for physiology or medicine was awarded to the British scientist who pioneered in-vitro fertilisation, Robert Edwards.

Phillips added: "With Geim and Novoselov from the University of Manchester taking the physics prize for their excellent work on graphene, I'm pleased to say this year's Nobels have had a distinctly chemical flavour."

The Nobel prize for literature will be announced tomorrow morning, the prize for peace on Friday, and economics next Monday.

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