Frenchman Yves Chauvin and Americans Robert Grubbs and Richard Schrock won the 2005 Nobel Chemistry prize for showing how to tailor-make molecules for cheaper, cleaner chemicals and drugs to combat diseases. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded them the $1.3 million prize for work in metathesis, where molecules “dance round and change partners” to create new molecules. In an unusual step, two men and two women from the committee then took to the floor of the academy hall and danced silently from partner to partner to give a simple illustration of the trio's complex work. “Imagination will soon be the only limit to what molecules can be built,” said the Academy citation, calling metathesis “an example of how basic science has been applied for the benefit of man, society and the environment”.
