Scientists who figured new way to build molecules win Nobel Chemistry Prize

Germany's Benjamin List and David MacMillan of the United States won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their development of a precise new tool for molecular construction, the jury said.

The duo was awarded "for their development of a precise new tool for molecular construction: organocatalysis. This has had a great impact on pharmaceutical research, and has made chemistry greener," the Nobel Committee said.

List and MacMillan, both 53, will share the $1.1 million prize.

MacMillan is a professor at Princeton University in the US, while List is a director at the Max Planck Institute in Germany.

"Many research areas and industries are dependent on chemists' ability to construct molecules that can form elastic and durable materials, store energy in batteries or inhibit the progression of disease," the Nobel Committee at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said in a statement.

"This work requires catalysts, which are substances that control and accelerate chemical reactions, without becoming part of the final product," it added, noting that prior to the work of the laureates, scientists believed there were only two types of catalysts, metals and enzymes.

READ MORE: Scientists who helped understand climate change win Nobel Prize in physics

In 2000, the researchers, working independently of each other, developed a third type, called "asymmetric organocatalysis", which relies on small organic molecules.

Ahead of this year's announcement, analysts said the field was wide open.

The Nobel season continues on Thursday with the much-anticipated prize for literature and with peace on Friday before the economics prize winds things up on Monday, October 11.

READ MORE: Two US scientists win Nobel Prize for Medicine