ScienceReutersKagan and Soai win 2026 Nobel chemistry prize for single molecular mirror creation
French and Japanese scientists Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai have won the 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for work that transformed how pharmaceuticals are made.
Scientists Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai won the 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for solving a long-standing riddle of how to form a single molecular mirror image, a discovery hugely important for pharmaceutical manufacturing.
Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai were awarded the 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for solving how to produce a single molecular mirror image in chemical reactions.
The Nobel Foundation explained that many drug molecules exist as two mirror images, where one has the therapeutic effect and the other can cause harmful side effects.
Their foundational work has been key to designing pharmaceutical manufacturing processes that produce only the beneficial form of a drug molecule.
Their discovery helps drug makers produce only the beneficial mirror image of a molecule, reducing the risk of harmful side effects in medicines.
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