Japanese Scientist Shirakawa, Co-Winner of 2000 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, Dies at 90
His discovery showed plastics could conduct electricity and helped create lighter materials used in solar cells, touch screens and mobile phones.
- Hideki Shirakawa, a 2000 Nobel Prize in Chemistry laureate, died in late August at age 90 at a hospital in Yokohama, according to Tsukuba University.
- While serving at the Tokyo Institute, Shirakawa accidentally created a thin, conductive film that challenged the prevailing belief that plastics could not conduct electricity like metal.
- Collaborating with American scientists Alan Heeger and Alan MacDiarmid in the United States, Shirakawa developed conductive polyacetylene at the University of Pennsylvania, earning the trio the Nobel Prize.
- These conductive materials now serve as lighter, more flexible alternatives to metal in solar cells, touch screens, and lithium-ion batteries used in modern electronics.
- Shirakawa was a professor emeritus at Tsukuba, making him the ninth Japanese Nobel laureate and the second from Japan to win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry after Kenichi Fukui.
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He received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry shared in 2000 for a work that opened the door to lighter, more flexible and economical materials.The mistake and curious story of the coffee break that ended up being key in the discovery that plastic can drive electricity.
Hideki Shirakawa Dies: Japanese Scientist and Nobel Prize Winner Passes Away at 90 | 🌎 LatestLY
Hideki Shirakawa died on Aug. 24, according to the University of Tsukuba, where he taught and researched after joining in 1979. The university did not specify a cause of death. Japan's largest newspaper, the Yomiuri, said Shirakawa died at a hospital in Yokohama, west of Tokyo. 🌎 Hideki Shirakawa Dies: Japanese Scientist and Nobel Prize Winner Passes Away at 90.
Japanese Scientist, Nobel Chemistry Prize Winner Hideki Shirakawa Dies At 90
The discovery by Shirakawa and two fellow American scientists, Alan Heeger and Alan MacDiarmid, demonstrated that plastic could conduct electricity like metal and be used in applications such as electronics.
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