JAPANESE organic chemist Kenso Soai, who shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with a French scientist a day earlier, said Thursday the discovery that earned him the award is “directly related to the origin of life”.
“In the long history of organic chemistry, nothing like this had ever been achieved before,” Soai said in an interview with Kyodo News, referring to his experimental demonstration of asymmetric autocatalysis. Asked why he had devoted himself to the research, Soai said he had not initially set out to uncover the origin of life but had been “extremely impressed” by the work of French chemist Louis Pasteur, who discovered molecular asymmetry.
“I want to speak about my research findings and the asymmetric nature of life,” he said of the Nobel Prize award ceremony he will attend in Sweden in December.
Kyodo
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