The Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Carolyn Bertozzi, Barry Sharpless and Morten Meldal for the development of click chemistry and bio-orthogonal chemistry. C2W | Mens & Molecule gathered some responses from the field.

‘Great news and a very deserved award’, responds Sander van Kasteren, professor of molecular immunology at Leiden University. ‘I’m also very happy that Morten Meldal is one of the three winners, because he always got a bit neglected as the inventor of copper click chemistry, though he has been just as important as Barry Sharpless.’ He is backed by Marc Robillard, founder and ceo of Tagworks Pharmaceuticals in Nijmegen, which applies bio-orthogonal click chemistry for drug delivery techniques. ‘It was certainly expected, bio-orthogonal click chemistry has long been mentioned as a contender and for these three to get the Nobel Prize because of it is completely justified.’

Floris Rutjes, professor of organic chemistry at Radboud University, had bet on mRNA technology as the winner. ‘Click chemistry had been on the list to win the prize for a long time, but I actually expected mRNA technology to be the winner this year. The Nobel Prize is not guided by current affairs, however. Purely based on impact, I would have chosen mRNA technology, but click chemistry is also absolutely deserving of the prize.’