On October 6, the 2021 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was announced: awarded to German scientist Benjamin Lister and American scientist David Macmillan for their contribution to the "development of asymmetric organic catalysis", which has had a huge impact on pharmaceutical research and made chemistry greener.
"The concept of catalysis is both simple and ingenious, and in fact many people wonder why we didn't think of it earlier," said John Oakwest, chairman of the Nobel Committee on Chemistry, which explained the biggest characteristic of the two new Kono prize winners - insisting on uniqueness and originality, not following the same path as others.
Asymmetric organic catalysis, an ingenious tool for constructing molecules
Constructing molecules is a tough art. Many fields of research and industries rely on the ability of chemists to build molecules that can form materials with specific properties, build high-performance batteries, or new drugs. And the construction of all these molecules usually requires a catalyst.
For a long time, researchers have always believed that chiral catalysis is in principle only available in two types of catalysts: metals and enzymes. But Benjamin and David independently developed a third catalyst in 2000— built on small organic molecules— and have since given a new term, asymmetric organic catalysis.
Zuo Zhiwei, a researcher at the Shanghai Institute of Organic Sciences of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, who was a postdoctoral fellow in David's laboratory, once heard David mention the original intention of this new discovery: in the 1990s, metal catalysts were very mature, but these catalysts were expensive, and in order to remove trace amounts of residual heavy metals, they brought a lot of production, environmental protection, and health costs. So David wanted to find a different way to find a low-cost and environmentally friendly catalyst that did not use metals.
Almost at the same time as David, Benjamin was doing a similar exploration, and eventually the two kicked out the door for organic catalysis at the same time, starting a boom in the field since 2000. Facts have proved that organic catalysis is not afraid of water, not afraid of oxygen, but also simple to operate, cheap, and welcomed by the industry.
Ding Kuiling, a well-known organic chemist and executive vice president of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, told reporters that organic catalysts can be used to drive a variety of chemical reactions, especially in the field of drugs, "when constructing molecules, chiral molecules often appear, just like our left and right hands, look exactly the same, but can not coincide." But in pharmaceuticals, generally only one of them is effective, and the other will even have toxic side effects, asymmetric organic catalysis for us to obtain high-quality and efficient good drugs, has made a great contribution."
"Until now, the two of them have been leaders in organic catalysis." He introduced that Benjamin has been committed to improving the efficiency of organic catalysis, and David has made a new development in the field of photocatalysis - this is also a Nobel Prize-level work.
Thinking outside the box, other people's repetitive experiments became their Nobel Prize work
"This catalytic concept is both simple and ingenious, in fact, a lot of people wonder why we didn't think about it earlier." This quote from John Oakwest, chairman of the Nobel Chemistry Commission, may be the biggest inspiration of these two Nobel laureates to the world.
In fact, the most basic work of Benjamin and David to win the Nobel Prize has been repeated countless times by countless people in the past few decades, and experimenting with proline can be said to be a skill that every graduate student studying organic chemistry must master. But who would have thought that from the simple repetitions that are taken for granted, there will be hidden discoveries that open up a new field?
"Do amino acids have to be part of an enzyme to catalyze chemical reactions?" Can a single amino acid, or similar simple molecule, do the same? No one had thought about it before them. Ding Kuiling said that this kind of innovative thinking that jumps out of the mindset and does not take the usual path is indeed worthy of careful consideration and study by all scientific researchers.
Zhou Jian, a professor at the School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering at East China Normal University, studied as a postdoctoral fellow in Benjamin's lab from 2005 to 2008. "He never works overtime, and what he appreciates most is to use a relaxed and leisurely attitude to overcome scientific problems." In his eyes, Benjamin likes students to drink and play football, meet and communicate, fully free to explore, "he wants me to concentrate on thinking about the most cutting-edge, the top-notch, but also the chemistry problems we like." 」
David's pursuit of originality is even more extreme. In Zuo Zhiwei's eyes, this supervisor has very strict requirements for the publication of papers, generally professors of the same level as him, at least more than 300 papers have been published, and he has only published about 100 papers so far, "There are many jobs that are actually enough to be published in international first-class journals, but if he feels that these works are not original enough, not enough inspiration for other people's research, and cannot have an important impact, he would rather not publish them."
The "Chinese edge" is quite deep, and they both have a number of Chinese postdocs
This year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry has finally returned to the field of pure chemistry, and these two new Kono Prize winners have a deep relationship with China, with more than 20 Chinese postdocs who have completed further studies in Benjamin's laboratory, and David's laboratory has also received more than a dozen Chinese postdocs.
Although the relationship between Benjamin and David is quite "tense" because of academic competition, and the industry rumors that they generally do not appear at the same academic conference, they are very friendly to their Chinese counterparts and Chinese students.
Before the outbreak, Benjamin would often suddenly appear in the park of the Shanghai Organic Institute, so familiar that he did not even say hello in advance, he would come to interview a few students, or run to the office of a friend to talk, and then leave. You Shuli, a researcher at the Shanghai Organic Institute, clearly remembers that Benjamin likes braised pork and must order it every time he comes to the institute to eat.
"Benjamin's 50th birthday was also spent in Shanghai, or on the Pujiang Cruises." Zhou Jian said that in 2018, he invited Benjamin to Shanghai to give a lecture, and by the way, he gathered all his students in China to Shanghai to celebrate the tutor's birthday together.
Recently, David also gave an online lecture to students at the Organic Institute. "In the past, he would come to China almost every two years, and in the United States he would take students to his home party once or twice a year." Zuo Zhiwei said that David knows how to enjoy life very well, and may be one of the most organic chemistry professors who play golf, and also one of the professors with the highest wine taste.
Author: Xu Qimin
Editor: Xu Qimin
Image source: Nobel Prize official website, courtesy of the interviewee