Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Jewish recipients of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry documented in the ThankJews directory. Jews are about 19% of all recipients — while making up roughly 0.2% of the world's population.
38 documented recipients
Adolf von Baeyer1835
Organic chemist who synthesized indigo dye; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1905
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Henri Moissan1852
Chemist who first isolated fluorine; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1906
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Otto Wallach1847
Chemist known for alicyclic compounds and terpenes; Nobel Prize 1910
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Richard Willstätter1915
Worked out the chemistry of chlorophyll and other plant pigments; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1915
Source: Wikipedia — Richard Willstätter
Fritz Haber1918
Synthesis of ammonia from atmospheric nitrogen and hydrogen, the basis of the Haber–Bosch process and of nitrogen fertiliser; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1918
Source: Wikipedia — Fritz Haber / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1918
George de Hevesy1943
Pioneer of radioactive tracers in chemistry and biology and co-discoverer of hafnium; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1943
Source: Wikipedia — George de Hevesy
Melvin Calvin1961
Photosynthesis
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1961
Max Perutz1962
Hemoglobin Structure
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1962
Christian Anfinsen1972
Showed with ribonuclease that a protein's amino-acid sequence alone determines its folded, active shape; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1972
Source: Wikipedia — Christian Anfinsen
William Stein1972
Ribonuclease Structure
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1972
Ilya Prigogine1977
Dissipative Structures
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1977
Herbert Brown1979
Chemist who found how to make sodium borohydride and developed hydroboration, turning boron compounds into important reagents of organic synthesis; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1979
Source: Wikipedia — Herbert Brown / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1979
Paul Berg1972
Biochemist who made the first recombinant DNA molecule in 1972, the starting point of genetic engineering, and organized the 1975 Asilomar conference on its safety; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1980
Source: Wikipedia — Paul Berg / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1980
Walter Gilbert1980
DNA Sequencing
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1980
Roald Hoffmann1981
Theoretical chemist and child survivor of the Holocaust who with Robert Woodward set out the orbital symmetry rules for the course of chemical reactions; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1981, shared with…
Source: Wikipedia — Roald Hoffmann / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1981
Aaron Klug1982
Crystallographic Electron Microscopy
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1982
Herbert Hauptman1985
X-ray Crystallography
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1985
Jerome Karle1985
Physical chemist who with Herbert Hauptman developed the direct methods for determining crystal structures from X-ray diffraction data; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1985
Source: Wikipedia — Jerome Karle / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1985
John Polanyi1929
Chemist known for reaction dynamics and chemiluminescence; Nobel Prize 1986
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Sidney Altman1989
Catalytic RNA
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 1989
Rudolph Marcus1923
Theoretical chemist whose Marcus theory explains the rates of electron transfer reactions, from corrosion to photosynthesis, and co-author of the RRKM theory of reaction rates; Nobel Prize in…
Source: Wikipedia — Rudolph Marcus / NobelPrize.org Chemistry 1992
George Olah1927
Chemist who used superacids to make fleeting carbocations stable enough to study; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1994
Source: Wikipedia — George Olah
Harold Kroto1996
Nobel laureate in chemistry (1996) for the discovery of fullerenes (buckyballs)
Source: Jinfo.org — Jewish Nobel Prize winners in Chemistry
Walter Kohn1923
Physicist, co-founder of density functional theory; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1998
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Alan Heeger1936
Chemist known for conductive polymers; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2000
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Chemistry
Aaron Ciechanover2004
Discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation
Source: Jinfo.org / Nobel Prize Chemistry 2004
Avram Hershko2004
Discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation
Source: Jinfo.org / Nobel Prize Chemistry 2004
Irwin Rose1926
Awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize for the discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation.
Source: Jinfo.org — Jews in Biology
Roger Kornberg2006
Biochemist who identified the nucleosome and captured the transcription machinery of eukaryotic cells in atomic detail; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2006
Source: Wikipedia — Roger Kornberg
Martin Chalfie1947
Showed that the jellyfish's green fluorescent protein (GFP) can light up chosen cells in living organisms; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2008
Source: Wikipedia — Martin Chalfie
Ada Yonath2009
Studies of the structure and function of the ribosome
Source: Jinfo.org / Nobel Prize Chemistry 2009
Dan Shechtman2011
Quasicrystals
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 2011
Robert Lefkowitz1943
Physician and biochemist who tracked down and characterised the G-protein-coupled receptors through which about half of all medicines act; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2012
Source: Wikipedia — Robert Lefkowitz
Martin Karplus2013
Theoretical chemist who pioneered computer simulations of molecules, from the Karplus equation to the first molecular dynamics of a protein; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2013
Source: Wikipedia — Martin Karplus
Michael Levitt2013
Computational Chemistry
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 2013
Arieh Warshel2013
Computational chemist who, with Michael Levitt, published the first computer model of an enzymatic reaction (the QM/MM approach); Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2013
Source: Wikipedia — Arieh Warshel
David Baker1962
Biochemist who created the Rosetta software and designed Top7, the first protein with a structure unknown in nature; Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2024 for computational protein design
Source: Wikipedia — David Baker
Henri Kagan2026
Chemist, pioneer of asymmetric catalysis (DIOP, nonlinear effects); Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2026
Source: Nobel Prize Chemistry 2026 / Wikipedia — Henri B. Kagan