Chemistry 2026 · Announced Oct 7
Henri B. Kagan
A chemistry pioneer who won at 95, forty years after his key paper.
Born 1930 · France · Université Paris-Saclay
40 yrs
The wait, from Kagan's key paper (1986) to the prize
95
Age when the prize was announced
2
People sharing this prize
Oct 7
Announced in 2026
Their part in the prize
Kagan showed in 1986 that the result of a handed reaction does not simply follow the purity of the helper you add. A slightly impure helper can give a much purer product. Chemists call this a non-linear effect.
Why it matters
Drug makers often need just one hand of a molecule, because the other can do nothing or do harm. This work also gives a clue to an old puzzle: why living things use only one hand.
The road to the prize
- 1986Kagan reports non-linear effects in handed reactions.
- 1995Soai reports a reaction that copies and boosts its own handedness.
- 2026Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Kagan is 95.
Shared with
The official reason for both: "for the discovery of non-linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis"