Chemistry technique brings Nobel Prize

More than three decades after he came home to tell his wife he had just made something interesting in his laboratory, MIT professor Richard R. Schrock was named a corecipient of a Nobel Prize in chemistry for devising a way to make important new compounds -- from drugs to plastics -- while using fewer ingredients and creating less hazardous waste.

Two other scientists, Robert H. Grubbs of the United States and Yves Chauvin of France, will share the $1.3 million award with Schrock for their work on what is known as metathesis, Greek for ''changing places," and refers to a chemical dance in which parts of molecules switch places.

This reaction, which the three scientists turned into a practical, easily controlled technique, is now widely used in industry, where it has led to more efficient ways of manufacturing fuel additives, herbicides, and specialized materials. It has spawned an active and growing field of its own, called organometallic chemistry. But the discovery has also been remarkable, chemists said yesterday, in the breadth of its repercussions: giving chemists working in very different areas a powerful, flexible tool to assemble molecules that have never been made before.

''I can't imagine a chemist in the world who is not thrilled by the fact that this prize was awarded," said Eric Jacobsen, a professor of chemistry at Harvard University. ''It has transformed many fields of chemistry."

But despite all the arcane, highly technical work involved, Schrock said yesterday that he was motivated by a simple passion: the desire to build. Standing yesterday in a wood-paneled room in MIT's Building 6, lit by television lights, Schrock said the work he did synthesizing molecules gave him the same kind of pleasure as two of his favorite pastimes: cooking and woodworking. In his office, which is decorated with the plaques of scientific honors he has earned, there are two Arts and Crafts tables he handmade, both walnut accented with other woods.

''I like to make things," he said.

His chemistry career began at age 8, when he got a chemistry set and made hydrogen -- which he said exploded dramatically, in a way that would satisfy just about any kid that age. His mother helped him get the supplies he needed, even bringing home ingredients from the pharmacy.

What Schrock, 60, and the other researchers recognized yesterday did was to give scientists a new way to build molecules. To understand metathesis, consider a molecule that is composed of two distinct parts, bonded together. Imagine that these parts are represented by two Lego pieces, one red and one blue, which are connected together. Metathesis starts with two of these molecules, each a red-blue amalgam, and then swaps the pieces, creating two new molecules: one with two red pieces, and one with two blue. A helper molecule, called a catalyst, breaks the molecules apart, swaps them, and then reforms them.

The excitement about the technique stems from the fact that it is able to break, and then reform, a common type of chemical bond. The molecules that make life possible, known as organic molecules, are often built on a backbone of carbon atoms linked together. Sometimes the bonds between the carbon atoms are particularly strong, which is called double or triple bonding. It is these powerful bonds that metathesis is able to break and form, allowing chemists to shuffle pieces from the vast libraries of organic molecules they have built up in their quest for new drugs, plastics, and other materials.

The three scientists were recognized by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for different contributions. As early as the 1950s, scientists had seen the molecular shuffling, but they did not know what was causing the reaction, according to a report released yesterday by the Academy. Chauvin, who has retired from the French Petroleum Institute, was the first to suggest how it might work, explaining in a paper published in 1970 that the reaction might be catalyzed by a molecule known as a metal carbene or a metal alkylidene.

Schrock and Grubbs, who is a professor at the California Institute of Technology, verified that Chauvin's theory was correct by getting it to work in the lab, and then turned it into a much more powerful technique than anticipated by synthesizing ingenious forms of these metal-based catalysts that were highly efficient and flexible.

The technique can be used to create entirely new kinds of molecules, and it can also be used to simplify the production of chemicals. The Academy hailed the work as an important example of ''green chemistry," the invention of chemical products and processes that reduce or eliminate the creation of hazardous byproducts.

''Metathesis is an example of how important basic science has been applied for the benefit of man, society, and the environment," according to a statement issued by the Academy.

Schrock is the second Nobel recipient from the Boston area named this week. On Tuesday, Harvard physicist Roy J. Glauber was honored for his work in quantum optics.

Schrock has two sons, and both have a creative streak: One plays jazz piano, the other is an artist. Schrock lives in Winchester with his wife, Nancy, who is an avid repairer of old books and is the chief collections conservator at the Harvard College Library.

Schrock said that there was no feeling like knowing one had just created something new -- be it a molecule or anything else -- and knowing that it will last forever.

''That is what keeps me interested," he said.

Gareth Cook can be reached at cook@globe.com. .