Green Chemistry in Pictures

Mexican chemist Mario Molina is widely known as ‘Mister Ozone.’ For his contributions to the understanding of how substances in the atmosphere can deplete the earth’s protective ozone layer he shared the Nobel Prize in 1995. Four years earlier, Germany’s ban on the use of ozone-destroying CFCs as aerosol propellants had gone into effect – a result of Molina’s work.

“Wait, let me fix this … there’s something missing over there.” Asked to draw an example of Green Chemistry, Molina takes the task very seriously. Step by step, he explains his artwork as it grows. He draws our ‘blue-green planet’ with electric cars, green cities, forests and clean oceans. “May I add something in writing? It’s just cheating a little.”

Arslan Ali works at the University of Karachi in Sindh Province. His visit to this year’s Nobel Laureate Meeting in Lindau is his first time in Germany. He has brought along some photos of his country on his cell phone and some cookies. As a researcher he feels a sense of responsibility to the community. “I believe that we can really change things with science.”

Pakistani researcher Arslan Ali holds up his picture and laughs, “We scientists are responsible for much of the pollution, and we have to do something about it!” There should be no more devastated landscapes – he longs for lush greenery. He draws his home region with snow-covered peaks, mountain lakes, and expansive green meadows. “That’s how I envision it!”

Munich-born Robert Huber is a Bavarian through and through. Who else would have urged his DW interviewer to sample the Weihenstephan beer at the Bavarian Evening? That beer is brewed in cooperation with Huber’s old university, the TUM. In 1988 Huber shared the Nobel Prize for his work on photosynthesis.

Robert Huber is one of the Nobel laureates who are less than thrilled about the term ‘green chemistry.’ He begins, “Green chemistry and all that stuff…” But then he does take up a drawing pencil. “The greenest chemistry of all is the chemistry we see in biology!” He sketches the sun with its rays shining on a leaf. “Its name is photosynthesis!”

Shaji Varghese is a postdoc at the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore, where he specializes in organic chemistry. His great role models are the American chemistry Nobel Prize winners Linus Pauling and Robert Woodward. His motivation? He wants to move science forward, to be curious. But he tells us that Lindau is not only a good place for science – “It’s also a great place to have a holiday!”

At the early morning Science Breakfast, Shaji Varghese draws what ‘green chemistry’ means for him. In today’s chemical processes humans are emitting too much greenhouse gas into the environment. Instead, he proposes using the carbon dioxide in a productive way. “We could make chemicals out of it,” Shaji says. And that might have a positive effect on climate change.

“That wouldn’t have been a good idea. I don’t have a good memory and I can never remember names – like the the names of all the bones,” he tells DW. Hänsch was very young when he decided to become a scientist. In 2005 he shared the Nobel Prize for his contributions to laser spectroscopy. His work enabled optical frequency measurements with extreme precision.

Hänsch sketches a paint pot. “I’ve just had my home renovated,” he explains. “After the painters were finished there was no unpleasant smell.” The physicist tells us they used a new, water-based paint with adhesive and aesthetic properties just as conventional paint, but without harmful solvents. “That’s why there’s a bee – it’s happy about the better air,” says Häntsch.

Ben Maoz is working on his doctorate at Tel Aviv University. “I want to know how the world around me ticks and how it works.” That is why he went into research. But scientists also have hobbies, and in Ben’s case they are mountain biking, hiking and reading. And what does he like best about Lindau? “The beer!”

Ben manages to sketch a vessel with a conical neck: an Erlenmeyer flask. “Inside it is a solution. The chemical reaction produces environmentally friendly bubbles – so chemistry is producing a clean earth,” he explains his artwork.