Editor's note:
This issue of this issue is Ryoji, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Vice Chairman of the World's Top Scientists Association (Ryoji) Noyori) not only has a very thrilling experimental experience as mentioned in the title, but also an influential and leading strategic scientist: he became the director of the Department of Science at Nagoya University in 1997; in 2000, he served as the webmaster of the International Research Center for Physical Sciences at Nagoya University; in the first half of 2001, he joined the Academic Review Committee of the Ministry of Science and Technology of the Ministry of Science and Technology of Japan, and served as the academic consultant of the Japan Academic Revitalization Association; from 2003 to 2015, he served as the chairman of the Institute of Physical and Chemistry of Japan (RIKEN)... He also called on Japan to carry out scientific and technological cooperation with China in the early 1980s, and organized the "Symposium of China-Japan Youth Scientist".
In today's content, we can see that he was shocked by the "creating something out of nothing" of chemical engineering because of his benefit from the academic atmosphere of his family, and eventually became a chemistry scientist. He embarked on a path that was off the beaten path in the field and worked hard for six years in uncertainty before he achieved major research results. He has come to China many times to participate in academic exchanges and was hired as a foreign academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences . He believes that science should be driven by freedom and should give scholars more freedom to obtain promising scientific research.
A famous Japanese organic chemist and professor at Nagoya University Ryoji Noyori . He won the 2001 Nobel Prize in Chemistry together with American scientists William Knowles and Barry Sharpless 3Barry Sharpless 3. When he learned about his award, Ryoji Nori could not hide his joy: " Nobel Prize is the highest honor for natural science researchers, and I feel supreme honor." Ryoji Nori is the third Japanese scientist to win the Nobel Prize in the field of chemistry after Kenichi Fukui and Hideki Shirakawa .
Ryuji Norihisa participated in the second World Top Scientist Forum Photo | WLF
"Immortal Bird" in the laboratory
Ryuji Norihisa delivered a speech through holographic projection at the third Top Scientist Forum Photo | WLF
1938 On September 3, 1938,Ryuji Norihisa was born in the suburbs of Kobe, Japan (now Ashiya City), and grew up with a sister and two younger brothers. His father, Kaneki, is a research director at a chemical company whose home is filled with scientific journals and books, as well as a variety of plastic and synthetic fiber samples, which have had a profound impact on Ryoji Noi. When he entered middle school, his father took him to a public meeting on the theme of nylon, where the lecturer proudly claimed that the new fiber could be synthesized with coal, air and hydration. That meeting had a huge impact on the 12-year-old Ryoji Noi, making him fully aware of the power of chemistry. "Chemistry is so amazing that it can produce so many things from almost nothing." He sighed. During the middle school period, Kazuo Nakamoto, a doctorate at Osaka University, taught Ryoji No's first chemistry class, which made him increasingly interested in chemistry. So, after graduating from high school, at the age of 18, he entered the most active institution for polymer chemistry research - Kyoto University , and began to study organic chemistry in his junior year.
After completing the master's degree in in 1963, Ryoji Noi was immediately appointed as the pioneer of asymmetric catalysis and a faculty member in the laboratory of Hitosi Nozaki, Kyoto University, and began to work with the latter to study molecular catalysts.They combined special organic molecules with metal atoms such as copper that can promote chemical reactions. This new catalyst can synthesize left-handed substances of optical isomers separately. This interesting asymmetric catalytic research later became the lifelong research direction of Ryoji Noi's lifelong research.
During this period, he often worked all night and was not afraid of the dangers of experiments, and had the nicknames of "Ghost Cao Jun" (which means "Morning Zhang Fei") and "Immortal Bird". According to Professor Nozaki's recollection, an accidental explosion occurred in an experiment. Noiji was seriously injured and had 20 stitches on his face and neck. However, he returned to the laboratory just two days later, and the elegant name of "Immortal Bird" spread from then on.
In 1968, Ryoji Noi went to the School of Science of Nagoya University as an associate professor. Although not many people realized the high practicality of organic synthesis of at that time, he decided to focus on organic synthesis research through organometallic chemistry. "I intuitively felt confident in this field," he said.
During the next two years of studying at Harvard , "I met many outstanding students and postdoctoral fellows, including Konrad Bloch (1964 Nobel Physiology and Medicine Prize winner) Barry Sharples (sharing the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Ryoji Noi and William Knowles in 2001). These reliable friends and their scientific colleagues later grew into outstanding researchers in academia and helped me in many ways. "
After he took asymmetric hydrogenation as his lifelong research direction and returned to Nagoya in 1970, Ryoji Noi began to continue studying organic synthesis and homogeneous catalysis through organometallic chemistry. Two years later, at the age of 33, he became a full professor at Nagoya University and served as director of the Graduate School of Science. Since 1974, he and his colleagues have worked hard for 6 years, experienced countless failures in the middle, and still persisted in uncertainty, and finally synthesized the chiral catalyst molecule BINAP with better performance, and shared the 2001 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with American scientists William Knowles and Barry Sharples . Ryoji Noi said that the molecular structure of BINAP is like a butterfly and is very beautiful.
BINAP molecular structure diagram｜Carl Roth
The big value generated by the small discovery
Professor Noiyi visited the Shanghai Institute of Organics｜Chinese Academy of Sciences
"Chemistry is not just an observation discipline, or a discipline that understands nature. Our disciplines have the ability to generate high value. Artificial synthetic substances and materials will determine our quality of life. Catalysts are the only reasonable and universal method to produce useful ingredients, and are cost-effective, energy-saving and environmentally friendly." Noiyiyi said in his speech at the "Future International Big Science" forum of the Second World Top Scientists Forum (WLF) held in Shanghai in 2019.
For many laymen of chemistry, Ryoji Noi’s research field “chiral catalytic hydrogenation reaction” is a bit unfamiliar, but it is actually not difficult to understand.
Many molecular structure forms in nature are chiral, just like the left and right hands of humans, which are symmetrical and absolutely different. This structure is also like the relationship between a mirror and a real object, so it is also called an optical isomer. Different structures lead to their completely different properties and functions. It is often reflected in chemical synthetic drugs that one side is beneficial and the other side is harmful. In artificial synthesis, if such chiral molecules want to leave only the beneficial form, they involve catalysis.
1968, William Knowles discovered that transition metals can be used to make chiral catalysts to produce chiral molecules with specific forms. In the subsequent development, Professor Barry Sharples from the United States used the oxidation reaction catalyst, and Knowles and Noyorizhi used the hydrogenation reaction catalyst to achieve asymmetric synthesis of optical isomers respectively.This has achieved breakthrough innovation in chemical synthesis methods and opened up new fields of molecular synthesis, which has revolutionary significance for the development of chemistry, especially organic chemistry. At the same time, BINAP, the hydrogenation reaction catalyst of Ryoji Noi, has a very economical reaction process, greatly reducing the harmful waste generated and is conducive to environmental protection.
The small chiral catalyst is of great significance to academic research and new chemical development. Especially in the field of drugs, its achievements have been applied to the development of cardiovascular drugs, antibiotics, , hormone anticancer drugs and central nervous system drugs. The efficacy of chiral drugs is several times or even dozens of times that of the original drugs. In 1983, Ryoji Noi and Takasago Spice Industry Company cooperated to adopt the manufacturing method of selecting only left-handed mint , making Takasago one of the largest mint manufacturers in the world.
"It has been 50 years since we discovered the catalyst. No one expected that such a small discovery would have such a great impact on global well-being," said Ryoji Noi.
Scientific research and development should be more free
Former President of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Bai Chunli (left) met with Ryoji Noriya Noriya Photo | Since the 80th generation of the 20th century, Ryoji Noriya has come to China many times to conduct academic exchanges with the Chinese academic community. For example, in 1982, he attended the second Japan-US Organometallic Chemistry and Inorganic Chemistry held in Shanghai; in 1985, he gave a special report at the Shanghai Institute of Organochemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences; in 2000, he attended the 19th IUPAC International Organometal Chemistry Conference in Shanghai.
On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the founding of of the National Natural Science Foundation of China in 2006, thanks to the great expansion of thinking in the scientific exchanges between the East and the West during his study abroad, Noriji Nori, who brought great expansion of thinking during his study abroad, once put forward his own suggestions for China's future scientific development: "China with a large population will become a country that cannot be ignored in the 21st century. The rapid modernization process has made China face a series of difficulties such as environmental destruction and instability of energy supply, which are also faced by all mankind. Unlike Western reductionism, China advocates the concept of nature of the unity of man and nature, and uses a holistic approach to understand man and nature. I hope that China can present a new value to future generations through unique scientific-based technological development." In 2011, Noriji became a foreign academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
As vice chairman of the World Top Scientists Association (WLA), he has participated in the World Top Scientists Forum (WLF) initiated by WLA many times. He believes that the Nobel Prize is not the only award to evaluate scientists' achievements, and said that China should be more patient with cultivating Nobel Prize winners in the natural sciences that were born in the local area. He has always advocated that researchers should not only be required to achieve results in a short period of time, but should provide them with a place where they can focus on scientific research for a long time. But he said that Japan is also facing similar problems at present. Among the three mainstream natural science research institutions in Japan, government agencies and corporate-funded laboratories, research is usually very purposeful.
"Really scientific research should be free, without these purpose, so I think the school's laboratories should maintain autonomy and freedom to drive scientific research with freedom. Only in this way can your scientific research have hope." Ryoji Noi said.
"The focus of global scientific research is moving from Europe and North America to other regions. I believe that the East will become a new scientific research center that is tied with Europe and the United States." In order to adapt to this trend, Noiri suggested at the third WLF last year that the government should give scholars more freedom, and at the same time encourage young scholars to overcome difficulties, set lofty ambitions, and be brave to explore unknown fields.
(Some sources: Nobel Prize official website official autobiography and interviews)
special author Zhang Zeqian
Editing Dongqingzi
Editor Yu Hua
Editor in charge Yu Hua
Editor
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