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- BBC News World
image source, Royal Swedish Academy of Science
Researchers Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal, and Barry Sharples are the winners of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their development of click and bioorthogonal chemistry.
“The 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry is regarding making difficult processes easier,” the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in announcing the prize.
Barry Sharpless and Morten Meldal they have laid the groundwork for a functional form of chemistry, click chemistry, in which molecular building blocks come together quickly and efficiently.
Carolyn Bertozzi has taken click chemistry to a new dimension and started using it in living organisms.
The research of the winners has allowed to improve the orientation of pharmaceutical products once morest cancer.
“This year’s Nobel does not deal with overly complicated issues”
In its press release, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences presents the prize saying that chemists have long been driven by the desire to build ever more complicated molecules.
image source, Getty Images
The winners were announced on the morning of this Wednesday, October 5, in Stockholm, Sweden.
In pharmaceutical research, this has involved the artificial recreation of natural molecules with medicinal properties.
“This has led to many admirable molecular constructs, but they are generally very time consuming and difficult to produce,” the statement says.
“This year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry does not deal with overcomplicated issues, but works with something that is easy and simple. Functional molecules can be built by following a direct route,” said Johan Åqvist, chairman of the Chemistry Nobel Committee.
What did the winners’ contributions consist of?
Barry Sharples was the forerunner of this so-called click chemistry.
It is the second Nobel Prize won by this American researcher. The first was awarded in 2001 for his contribution to obtaining optically pure chiral molecules by oxidation reaction with enantioselective catalysts.
Around the year 2000, Sharples coined the concept of click chemistry, which is a simple and reliable form of chemistry where reactions occur quickly and unwanted by-products are avoided.
image source, Getty Images
Johan Åqvist, Chairman of the Chemistry Nobel Committee, explaining the achievements of the laureates.
Shortly following, Morten Meldal and Barry Sharples himself, independently, presented what is now considered the crown jewel of click chemistry: copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition.
“This is an elegant and efficient chemical reaction that is now in widespread use. Among many other uses, it is used in the development of pharmaceuticals, to map DNA and create materials that are more fit for purpose,” the Academy explained.
Bertozzi took click chemistry to a new level.
To map important but elusive biomolecules on the surface of cells (glycans), he developed click reactions that function inside living organisms. Its bioorthogonal reactions take place without altering the normal chemistry of the cell, added those responsible for the institution.
These reactions are now used globally to explore cells and track biological processes. Using bioorthogonal reactions, researchers have improved the targeting of anticancer pharmaceuticals, which are now being tested in clinical trials.
“Click chemistry and bioorthogonal reactions have brought chemistry into the era of functionalism. This is bringing the greatest benefit to humanity,” says the Academy.
The credentials of the winners
Carolyn R. Bertozzi was born in 1966 in the United States. In 1993 she received her Ph.D. from UC Berkeley University in California. He is currently Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Laboratory Professor at Stanford University in California.
Morten Meldal was born in Denmark in 1954. He completed his doctorate in 1986 at the Technical University of Denmark, Lyngby. He’s professor at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
K. Barry Sharples was born in Philadelphia, USA, in 1941. He received his doctorate in 1968 from Stanford University. She is professor at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California.
