World News for Students of English

15-10-2026 07:00

The 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry has been awarded to Henri Kagan and Kenso Soai for solving a long-standing scientific mystery regarding molecular mirror images.

Many chemical molecules exist in two mirror-image forms, much like a person’s left and right hands. In nature, living things almost always use only one version, while the other form is absent or inactive. Producing just the helpful version has historically been a huge challenge for chemical manufacturing. Controlling this balance is critical for medicine because two mirror-image molecules can have vastly different effects on the human body. For instance, while one version of a drug acts as a helpful painkiller, its mirror image can be inactive or even highly dangerous, as seen in historical medical tragedies.

The duo’s discovery of unique chemical processes allows scientists to selectively produce the safe, effective version of a molecule. This breakthrough has revolutionized the pharmaceutical industry and made everyday medicines far safer and more effective.

Difficult words: absent (not present or not existing in a place), duo (two people who work or perform together), revolutionize (to completely change the way something is done or made).

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