6 January 2021
Chad Mirkin received the 2020 Philip Hauge Abelson Prize. | Neil Orman/AAAS
Since 1985, the annual Philip Hauge Abelson Prize has recognized individuals who have contributed significantly to the advancement of science in the United States. In 2020, the prize went to Chad Mirkin, one of the world’s most cited chemists, for his contributions to the fields of chemistry and nanoscience.
Mirkin, the director of the International Institute for Nanotechnology at Northwestern University, discovered and developed spherical nucleic acids, structures made by chemically arranging densely packed, highly oriented strands of DNA around a nanoparticle core. These structures can catalyze chemical transformations that conventional nucleic acids cannot, properties that have led to the development of diagnostic tools and pharmaceuticals.