Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2025 goes to Kitagawa, Robson, Yaghi

The 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi for the development of metal–organic frameworks by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

“BREAKING NEWS. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the 2025 #NobelPrize in Chemistry to Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi “for the development of metal–organic frameworks,” stated a post in the official X handle of the Nobel Prize.

Research dates back to 1989

According to the Nobel Committee, the research, dating back to 1989, the three laureates “have developed a new form of molecular architecture.”

“They have created molecular constructions with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow,” the committee said.

The announcement was made by Hans Ellegren, secretary-general of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. It was the third prize announced this week.

“These constructions, metal-organic frameworks, can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyse chemical reactions,” the Nobel Committee said in a statement.

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Scientists worked separately

Robson, 88, is affiliated with the University of Melbourne in Australia, Kitagawa, 74, with Japan's Kyoto University and Yaghi, 60, with the University of California, Berkeley.

Although the scientists have been working separately, they have been adding to each other's breakthroughs, devised ways to make stable metal organic frameworks, which may be compared to the timber framework of a house.

These structures can absorb and contain gases inside these frameworks, with many practical applications today, such as capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or sucking water out of dry desert air.

“Metal-organic frameworks have enormous potential, bringing previously unforeseen opportunities for custom-made materials with new functions,” Heiner Linke, chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry, said in a news release.

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What Nobel Committee said

Olof Ramström, a member of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry, described the trio's discovery as similar to Hermione Granger's enchanted handbag in the fictional “Harry Potter” series: small on the outside but very large on the inside.

Kitagawa spoke to the committee and the press over the phone on Wednesday after his win was announced.

“I'm deeply honoured and delighted that my long-standing research has been recognised," he said.

There have been 116 chemistry prizes given to 195 individuals between 1901 and 2024.

The 2024 prize was awarded to David Baker, a biochemist at the University of Washington in Seattle, and to Demis Hassabis and John Jumper, computer scientists at Google DeepMind, a British-American artificial intelligence research laboratory based in London.

(With agency inputs)