Chemistry Nobel for scientists who developed massively porous ‘super sponge’ materials

Nature reports that Susumu Kitagawa of Kyoto University, Richard Robson of the University of Melbourne, and Omar Yaghi of UC Berkeley have jointly won the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for pioneering metal-organic frameworks, or MOFs. These materials are extraordinarily porous networks whose internal cavities create enormous surface areas relative to their mass, enabling storage of gases, selective separation, and potentially targeted drug delivery. The prize underscores not only the fundamental chemistry but also the looming industrial and environmental applications, from carbon dioxide capture to wastewater purification. The researchers' work spans the 1980s to today, showing how design, stability and tunability of MOFs open the door to a range of technologies. The Nature article highlights the science and its broader implications.