Molecular Machines Fetches 2016 Chemistry Nobel For Stoddart, Sauvage, and Feringa

This year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded jointly to UK-born Sir J. FraserStoddart of Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA, a French national Jean-PierreSauvage of University of Strasbourg, France, and Bernard L. Feringa of University of Groningen, of the Netherlands for their design and synthesis of the molecular machines. The trio will share the 8m kronor or USD 932,210 prize money. The nanomolecular machines developed by the trio are tiny. They could be used to deliver drugs within the human body and have potential applications in the pharmaceutical industry. They have the potential to unleash the whole new era in the design of smart molecules. 

Stoddart’s (a) Molecular Borromean Rings (Credit: M. Stone, Wikimedia Commons) and (b) Rotaxane-based Molecular Machines (Stoddart, J. F. et al. A Molecular Elevator. Science 2004, 303 (5665), 1845–1849).