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Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics

Nobel in Chemistry for research on carbon

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to give this year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry a team of three scientists: the American Richard F. Heck Japanese and Ei-ichi Negishi and Akira Suzuki .

The three scientists received the award for the development of so-called cross-coupling reactions catalyzed by palladium, "a chemical tools have greatly improved the ability to manufacture advanced composites, carbon-based molecules" as complex as those created by nature itself, "the Nobel Committee.

None of the three scientists worked together, but his experimental work separately managed the development of this important tool in chemistry and the ability to use today.

To explain the importance of the work of Heck, Negishi and Suzuki, the Swedish Academy tells the story of a sponge discovered in the Caribbean Sea in the eighties: the Discodermia Dissoluta . It turns out that this sponge is a chemistry teacher able to fend off his enemies by producing a complex chemical compound that is poisonous compound, when tested in the laboratory, was found to have remarkable therapeutic properties: it acts as an antibiotic, and antiviral as anti-inflammatory and even could serve as a chemotherapy drug. But it would be impossible to think of an exploit for pharmaceutical substance produced in small quantities on the seabed.

That's where the reactions of organic chemistry developed by the three winners, and that they can synthesize the compound that produces Discodermia Dissoluta in sufficient quantities.

is not the only example. In addition to drugs, these reactions can develop revolutionary materials such as plastics, light-emitting electronic industry or compounds useful in agriculture as fungicides.

The chemical organic applied studies how to create carbon-based compounds such as plastics and pharmaceuticals. To achieve this, the chemicals have to be able to join the carbon atoms to form functional molecules. However, the carbon is a stable element, which does not react easily with others.

The cross-linking catalyzed by palladium of the chemicals provided a new tool to work more efficiently. In reactions produced by Heck, Negishi and Suzuki , carbon atoms meet palladium atoms (rich in electrons and, therefore, a "magnet" for carbon), causing a rapid chemical reaction (ie, a catalyst ).

Currently, catalysis by the palladium of cross-linking of organic synthesis is used in research worldwide, the development of important drugs to combat cancer or powerful virus, or in the commercial production, such as pharmaceuticals and molecules used in the electronics industry .
Sources and Images: Nobelprize / El Pais / EspacioCiencia