The 2015 King Faisal International Prize for Science has been awarded to Berkeley chemistry professor Omar Yaghi. He shares the award with Michael Grätzel of the Swiss Federal Institute of Techology.
The award is presented by the King Faisal Foundation, a philanthropic organization established in 1976 by the sons and daughters of the late King Faisal in commemoration of their father. The science prize was first awarded in 1984 and rotates among the fields of physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics.
Yaghi, who is co-director of the Kavli ENSI, co-director of CARA by BASF and a Faculty Scientist at LBNL, was awarded the Faisal prize for his “seminal contributions in the field of metal organic frameworks (MOFs).” Grätzel was recognized for his “foundational and practical discoveries in the development of photo-electrochemical systems for solar energy conversion.”
Previous winners of the Faisal science prize include chemists Richard Zare and James Fraser Stoddart and Nobel Laureates Stephen Chu, former LBNL director and DOE secretary, and Ahmed H. Zewail, a former College of Chemistry postdoc.
The prize includes a 24-carat gold medal and $200,000, distributed equally between the winners.