Trio wins Nobel in chemistry for developing ‘metal-organic frameworks’

The 2025 Nobel Prize in chemistry has been awarded to a trio of researchers – a Japanese, a Briton and a Jordanian – for the development of “metal-organic frameworks.”

Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar Yaghi will share the prize for providing chemists “with new opportunities for solving some of the challenges” the field faces, the Nobel Committee announced Wednesday at a ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden.

“Metal-organic frameworks have enormous potential, bringing previously unforeseen opportunities for custom-made materials with new functions,” says Heiner Linke, chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry.

The committee praised the laureates for creating molecular constructions with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow.

“These constructions, metal-organic frameworks, can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyse chemical reactions,” it said.

Last year, the prize was awarded to a trio of scientists who used artificial intelligence to “crack” the code of almost all known proteins, the “chemical tools of life.” Among them was Demis Hassabis, CEO of Google DeepMind in London, whose work helped develop an AI model to predict the complex structures of proteins – a problem that had been unsolved for 50 years.

In 2023, the prize was shared by three researchers who worked to discover and develop quantum dots, used in LED lights and TV screens, as well as by surgeons when removing cancer tissue.

The prize carries a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million).

Source: CNN