Japanese scientist Kenso Soai delivered a lecture in Tokyo on Tuesday, discussing asymmetric autocatalytic reaction, the theme that led to him winning the 2026 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Hosted by the Chemical Society of Japan, the lecture by the 76-year-old professor emeritus at the Tokyo University of Science was attended by about 2,000 people, including online participants. In the reaction, a tiny difference between the two mirror-image molecular forms, much like left and right hands, is amplified until one of them predominates.
The process is called the Soai reaction. In 1990, Soai published his first research findings resulting in the Soai reaction. In a question-and-answer session during the lecture, he expressed his commitment to future research, saying, “I hope to study a wide range of possible causes for the left-right imbalances.” “I was interested in basic or rather fundamental matters,” Soai said at a news conference following the lecture, explaining what inspired his research.
He said that he hopes to attend the Nobel Prize award ceremony, to be held in Stockholm in December, in “high spirits.” On a lecture he is set to deliver in the Swedish capital during the upcoming visit, Soai said that he plans to talk about his research results while highlighting contributions by 19th-century French chemist and microbiologist Louis Pasteur, who also studied molecular asymmetry.
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