DOE-Supported Researchers Are Co-Winners of 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry

WASHINGTON, DC – Secretary of Energy Samuel W. Bodman today congratulated Dr. Richard R. Schrock of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Dr. Robert H. Grubbs of the California Institute of Technology for co-winning the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

“On behalf of the Department of Energy, I congratulate Americans Robert H. Grubbs and Richard R. Schrock and Yves Chauvin of France for winning the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discoveries that enable industry to produce plastics and drugs more efficiently and with less hazardous waste,” Secretary Bodman, a trained chemical engineer, said.

“For decades, the Department of Energy has been the leading federal supporter of catalytic chemistry, so we are especially pleased to highlight Dr. Schrock’s affiliation with the DOE Office of Science, dating back to 1979 and continuing to this day,” Secretary Bodman said. “In addition, Dr. Grubbs’ initial work in homogeneous catalysis was supported from 1979 through 1988 by the DOE Office of Science.”

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry jointly to Chauvin, Grubbs and Schrock “for the development of the metathesis method in organic synthesis,” a way to rearrange groups of atoms within molecules that the Academy’s news release likened “to a dance in which the couples change partners.”

The Department of Energy has sponsored 42 Nobel Laureates since DOE’s inception in 1977 – and a total of 82 Nobel Laureates associated with DOE and its predecessor agencies since 1934.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences news release announcing the 2005 Nobel Prize in Chemistry is at http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2005/press.html.

Information about Nobel laureates supported by the Department of Energy is available at http://www.science.doe.gov/sub/accomplishments/heroes/heroes.htm.

Media contact(s):
Jeff Sherwood, 202/586-5806

Number: R-05-233