2024 Nobel Prizes in Chemistry and Economic Science

Speakers: Alan Schmidt Ruth Schmidt

The 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was for computational protein design and protein structure prediction.  They can predict proteins' complex structure and have built entirely new proteins.  Proteins can be used as pharmaceuticals, vaccines, nanomaterials, and tiny sensors.  The 2024 Nobel Prize in Economics was for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity. They provide new insights into why there are such vast differences in prosperity between nations.

Dr. Alan D. Schmidt received a Bachelor of Science in chemical engineering from Michigan State University and doctorate in chemical engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has done industrial polymerization research and development.  He retired from being an environmental engineer at the Indiana Department of Environmental Engineering.