Breakthrough materials win Nobel Prize in Chemistry

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded on Wednesday 8 October to Japanese researcher Susumu Kitagawa, American researcher Richard Robson and Jordanian-Saudi-American researcher Omar Yaghi ‘for the development of metal-organic frameworks’, also known by the acronym MOF (Metal-Organic Framework), announced the Nobel Committee, a group of scientists responsible for selecting the winners. Like a sponge, MOFs are capable of storing and then releasing gases or other chemical molecules into the environment. Developed at the end of the last century by the laureates, they are now the subject of numerous experimental applications and are beginning to be used in certain industrial processes, notably ‘to capture water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide or store toxic gases,’ the Nobel Committee said in a statement.

‘This Nobel Prize is not really a surprise. MOFs represent a very active field of chemistry, combining fundamental research and emerging industrial applications,’ Christian Serre, researcher and member of the French Academy of Sciences, specialising in porous materials, explains to Brief‌.‌science. ‘They are of interest not only to chemists, but also to engineers, doctors and other specialists who are beginning to use and test these materials,’ he adds. Read more. (French)

Morgane Guillet, Imène Hamchiche and Laurent Mauriac, 17 October 2025, Brief.Science