(Reuters) Patrick Lannin and Simon Johnson - Israeli scientist Daniel Shechtman, 70, of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, whose work was once ridiculed for being out of line with received thinking, won the 2011 Nobel Prize for chemistry on Wednesday for discovering different ways in which atoms could be packed together in solid materials. "His discovery was extremely controversial. In the course of defending his findings, he was asked to leave his research group," said the Nobel Committee for Chemistry at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which made the award. "However, his battle eventually forced scientists to reconsider their conception of the very nature of matter."
2011-10-05 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive