The 2010 Nobel prize in chemistry has been awarded to Richard Heck, Ei-ichi Negishi and Akira Suzuki for work that has greatly improved the ability to synthesise organic chemicals. This is important in many fields of manufacturing, especially pharmaceuticals and electronics where rare compounds found in nature are often in higher demand than nature can provide. Of course the methods can also be used to produce organic (carbon-based) molecules that nature has not discovered yet, but which may still be useful to us. The work was done in the US, China and Japan.
Congratulations to these three gentlemen!
Huping
Free access to articles from 2010 Nobel Prize Winners in chemistry in PDF format published in the Journal of Organometallic Chemistry and in Tetrahedron Letters.