Scientists David Baker, Demis Hassabis and John Jumper have won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, the awarding body said on Wednesday, for their work on protein structure.
The prize, widely considered one of the most prestigious in the scientific world, is awarded by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm and is worth the equivalent of Cdn $1.45 million, divided among the award winners.
Half the prize was awarded to Baker “for computational protein design” while the other half was shared by Hassabis and Jumper “for protein structure prediction,” the academy said.
Baker works at the University of Washington in Seattle, while Hassabis and Jumper both work at Google Deepmind in London. Baker and Jumper are Americans, and Hassabis is British.
The third award given annually, the chemistry award follows the medicine and physics awards announced earlier this week.
The Nobel Prize was established by the will of dynamite inventor and wealthy businessman Alfred Nobel and is awarded to “those who, in the previous year, have rendered the greatest benefit to mankind.”
The prize in chemistry follows this week’s announcement of Nobels in medicine and physics. The literature prize will be announced on Thursday, and the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday.
The economics prize was announced on 14 October.
The Nobel Prizes are awarded to the winners on December 10.