Israeli Chemist Wins Nobel Prize
Israeli scientist Daniel Shechtman has been named as the winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in chemistry, the award panel for the prestigious prize announced Wednesday. He was awarded the prize for his discovery of patterns in atoms called quasicrystals, a chemical structure that researchers previously thought was impossible.
Tel Aviv-born Shechtman, 70, is a professor at Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, in Haifa, as well as an Associate of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Ames Laboratory, and a professor at Iowa State University.
The Nobel Committee for Chemistry at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said Shechtman had discovered quasicrystals, which it said were like “fascinating mosaics of the Arabic world reproduced at the level of atoms” and which never repeated themselves.
Up until then, scientists had thought the atom patterns inside crystals had to repeat themselves. The Academy said Shechtman’s discovery in 1982 fundamentally changed the way chemists look at solid matter.
Shechtman’s discovery opened the door for experiments in the use of the quasicrystals in everything from diesel engines to frying pans.
For more, go to Haaretz.com
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
