David W.C. MacMillan

Facts

David MacMillan

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David W.C. MacMillan
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2021

Born: 16 March 1968, Bellshill, United Kingdom

Affiliation at the time of the award: Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, USA

Prize motivation: “for the development of asymmetric organocatalysis”

Prize share: 1/2

Work

Catalysts, substances that accelerate chemical reactions, without becoming part of the final product, are important for chemists' ability to construct molecules. In 2000, David MacMillan and Benjamin List developed a new type of catalysis that builds upon small organic molecules. An important capacity of many such catalysts is the ability to build only one of two mirror image variants of a molecule. Such catalysts are used for example in pharmaceutical research and have made chemistry more environmentally friendly.

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MLA style: David W.C. MacMillan – Facts – 2021. NobelPrize.org. Nobel Prize Outreach AB 2023. Thu. 8 Jun 2023. <https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2021/macmillan/facts/>

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