By 
Mason Wakley2026-10-07T14:10:00
Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai share the prize for ‘the discovery of non-linear effects and autocatalysis in asymmetric organic synthesis’
Henri Kagan at the University Paris-Sud in France and Kenso Soai at the Tokyo University of Science in Japan have won the 2026 Nobel prize in chemistry for their work developing organic reactions that catalyse themselves and lead to an excess of one enantiomer over the other. These autocatalytic reactions also shed light on one of chemistry’s greatest mysteries – how life came to favour molecules with a certain handedness.
