Over five decades ago, Richard Robson was building molecular models out of wooden balls and rods for his students at the University of Melbourne. Each hole had to be drilled with precision to reflect the geometry of atomic bonding. But as the models came together, Robson had an epiphany: The placement of the holes — not the connections themselves — determined the overall structure. What if, he wondered, atoms could be coaxed into forming larger architectures, guided by their own geometric preferences? When Robson combined copper ions with multi-armed molecules, they self-organised into a crystalline framework with large cavities. In 1989, in a paper, Robson suggested such materials could possess novel properties. The work would lay the structural foundation “for the development of metal-organic frameworks” that has won Robson, Susumu Kitagawa, and Omar M Yaghi the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
The very idea of engineering empty space — to design the voids in which molecules may wander, interact or be captured — stands as a conceptual turn, especially in an era beset by climate-induced crises. In championing the re‐engineering of molecular space as crucial to environmental and technological redress, the award signals a pivot. As tools for carbon sequestration, pollutant removal, and water extraction from air, metal-organic frameworks built from metals and organic (carbon-based) molecules hold out promise for what the Nobel Committee termed as “new opportunities for solving some of the challenges we face”.
