Two Win King Faisal Science Prize

This month, the King Faisal Foundation in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, presented the 2003 King Faisal International Prize for Science (Chemistry) to M. Frederick Hawthorne and Koji Nakanishi. Each received a gold medallion and the pair shared a cash award of about $200 000.

Hawthorne, University Professor of Chemistry at UCLA, is “one of the most creative and productive chemists in the world,” according to the foundation. He is being recognized for his research in boron chemistry, which extends over many fields ranging from the synthesis of new classes of compounds to catalysis and novel therapies for cancer. His research “could lead to the development of a ‘silver bullet’ to target cancerous cells for destruction while sparing healthy ones,” says the citation.

Nakanishi, Centennial Professor of Chemistry at Columbia University, is “an equally eminent chemist.” Through his research in biologically active natural products, he has “established the properties and elucidated the structures of many chemical compounds including antibiotics, carcinogenic materials, and anticancer products.” Over the years, he has also been working on the mechanism of vision. His recent research on age-related macular degeneration is “likely to accelerate the development of a treatment [of this disease], which afflicts many elderly people.”

Science Prize topics rotate annually. Next year’s topic will be biology.