Morten P. Meldal facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Morten Meldal
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Meldal in 2023
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Morten Peter Meldal
16 January 1954 Denmark
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| Education | Technical University of Denmark (BS, MS, PhD) |
| Awards | Nobel Prize in Chemistry (2022) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Organic chemistry |
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| Thesis | Reactions of Unsaturated Sugars with Hydrogen Halides (1983) |
| Doctoral advisor | Klaus Bock |
Morten Peter Meldal, born on January 16, 1954, is a famous Danish chemist. He is also a Nobel laureate, which means he won a very important award. He works as a professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark. He is best known for helping to create a special chemical process called the CuAAC-click reaction. He developed this amazing reaction at the same time as, but separately from, two other scientists, Valery V. Fokin and K. Barry Sharpless.
Contents
Who is Morten Meldal?
Early Life and Education
Morten Meldal studied chemical engineering at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU). He earned both his bachelor's and PhD degrees from this university. His PhD research focused on making new types of sugar molecules.
From 1983 to 1988, he worked as a researcher in organic chemistry. He worked at the DTU, then at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology at Cambridge University, and later at the University of Copenhagen. In 1996, he became an assistant professor at DTU. Since 1998, he has led a special group at the Carlsberg Laboratory that focuses on making new chemical compounds.
Amazing Discoveries: Click Chemistry
Early in his career, Morten Meldal created several new ways and tools for making peptides. Peptides are like small proteins, which are important building blocks in living things. He developed a method called "multiple-column synthesis." This method is used to make many different peptides and other organic compounds at once.
He also introduced a special chemical reaction involving acetylenes and azides. This reaction is now a key part of "click chemistry." Click chemistry is a way to quickly and easily join molecules together, like snapping two LEGO bricks. Meldal's team showed that this reaction works well with most other chemical processes. This means it can be used in many different areas, like making new materials or connecting molecules in biology.
More recently, Meldal has worked on new ways to combine organic chemistry with peptide chemistry. He has also developed methods to find new substances that can interact with special receptors in cells.
In 2019, Meldal helped start a company called Betamab Therapeutics ApS. This company worked on creating "beta-bodies," which are like peptide versions of antibodies. Antibodies are important parts of our immune system. The company closed in 2021.
Top Honors and Awards
Morten Meldal received the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He shared this prestigious award with Carolyn R. Bertozzi and Karl Barry Sharpless. They were honored "for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry." Bioorthogonal chemistry is a way to perform chemical reactions inside living systems without disturbing them.
See also
In Spanish: Morten Peter Meldal para niños
