Nobel Prize in Chemistry Awarded to Kagan and Soai for Solving a Mystery of Asymmetry in the Chemistry of Life
Some molecules, such as amino acids, exist in two forms that are mirror images of each other. However, living organisms contain only one of these mirror images. For a long time, the origin of this chemical asymmetry was a mystery to chemists. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry to Henri B. Kagan and Kenso Soai “for the discovery of nonlinear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis,” which provided the solution to this enigma.
0