Ben Feringa has a predecessor in Sibrandus Stratingh, who designed the first electric carriage in 1835. This is a replica of this carriage. Like Stratingh, Feringa, is a professor at the University of Groningen. In 2011, he produced a molecular car.
Ben Feringa donated the carriage to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2016.
Ben Feringa was the first to produce molecules that look and behave like extremely small cars. In the vial is a white powder that consists of a quintillion (10^18) molecular cars.
Ben Feringa donated the molecular motors to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2016.
When Ben Feringa grew up on his parents’ farm in the Netherlands, he wore traditional Dutch clogs, and when he put his right foot in the left shoe or vice versa, it hurt. Since then, he has never forgotten the difference between right and left. This was useful when he later devoted himself to chemistry, where mirror symmetry (or “chirality”) is an important concept when describing various molecular properties. Feringa developed a molecule that worked like a rotary motor. A basic problem with the molecular motor was how to control the rotation to the right or left, respectively.
Ben Feringa donated the clogs to the Nobel Prize Museum in 2016.
