Long before the Nobel committee awarded Omar Yaghi the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, he was pursuing a bold idea in the ’90s: that chemistry wasn’t limited to discovery, but could be built from the molecular level up. This work began when he was a professor at ASU.
At the time, the University’s chemistry and biochemistry department was bursting with collaboration and experimentation, and it was within that environment that Yaghi’s early ideas behind reticular chemistry began taking shape.
“My philosophy is that if you do experiments, do the observations and you base your decisions on those observations, eventually the experiment will work,” Yaghi said.
Yaghi described his approach to chemistry as that of a “molecular architect,” constructing structures invisible to the naked eye. He said he has always been captivated by the beauty of molecules.
Amid that collaborative setting, the University was not just a place where he experimented and worked at, but a place he recalled feeling at home, starting his professorship in 1992.
“I can’t describe why, but I just felt ASU was very welcoming to me,” Yaghi said.
Decades later, Yaghi still remembers the people who helped shape his early career at the University. They ranged from the then-department chairman, LeRoy Eyring — whose early encouragement was crucial at the beginning of his faculty career — to the colleagues who worked alongside him, such as Michael O’Keeffe and Hailian Li.
“His (Eyring’s) help was so important to me,” Yaghi said. “As a chairman, he supported me at the very early stage of my career. (I have) always remembered his kindness and his help.”
Yaghi also credited O’Keeffe, who he worked with on linking molecules into larger, stable structures. This collaboration laid the groundwork for the first concepts of reticular chemistry, including the synthesis of early metal-organic frameworks, according to ASU News.
“The other important factor was that I met Michael O’Keeffe,” Yaghi said. “Michael O’Keeffe is considered a guru of solid state structures.”
Even early on, Yaghi recalls recognizing the potential impact his experiments could have.
“We knew that if we (succeeded) as we did, this (would) be very important, and that’s because if you look at the history of chemistry, the most important developments involved controlling matter,” Yaghi said.
Neal Woodbury, vice president and chief science and technology officer for ASU’s Knowledge Enterprise, was a fellow faculty member who served with Yaghi on a graduate studies committee.
Though their research did not overlap, Woodbury remembered the program back then was lively and full of ideas — and that having a brilliant mind like Yaghi’s in that environment helped spark the breakthroughs that followed.
“Dr. Yaghi has always been one of these people that’s thinking about some new way of using chemistry to create a new capability,” Woodbury said. “He’s just one of those people that’s always inventing the next thing that’s coming down the line … He was always pushing to find the next thing.”
Yaghi’s legacy is solidified by the research he conducted and the people he mentored. Among them is Theresa Reineke, the prager chair in macromolecular science and a professor at the University of Minnesota, who began her graduate studies under Yaghi’s mentorship at the University.
“I came in to the chemistry graduate program as a graduate student in chemistry at Arizona State, and I had interviewed advisers and had selected to work with him,” Reineke said. “I was really inspired by the work his group was doing in material science and porous materials research.”
Working in Yaghi’s lab, Reineke found more than just a research mentor, but someone who inspired her future aspirations.
“I thought he was a brilliant and creative scientist,” Reineke said. “He was also very encouraging of me in my future goals. I wanted to be a faculty member, so he was really encouraging and I would say helped build my confidence to apply.”
Reineke said that one of the biggest lessons she carried from Yaghi was the value of creativity — how it can propel science forward and improve quality of life.
Years later, seeing Yaghi’s groundbreaking ideas recognized on the world stage felt rewarding for those who had either worked with him or watched his work take flight.
For Woodbury, seeing his former colleague’s work receive Nobel recognition was affirming.
“It was very exciting that that’s something that initiated here,” Woodbury said. “That I tangentially watched happen, had given rise to, ultimately, something that important. That’s always fun to see something like that happen.”
As for Reineke, the news was not only a breakthrough but a full-circle moment.
“I was ecstatic, elated and very excited that work I had contributed to in his lab was recognized by this very amazing accolade,” Reineke said.
Beyond his own research, Yaghi encourages the next generation of scientists to think boldly and push the boundaries of science.
“All young scientists should pursue unconventional ideas,” Yaghi said. “To solve that challenge, you’re likely to make discoveries.”
Edited by Senna James, George Headley and Pippa Fung.
Reach the reporter at mmart533@asu.edu.
Like The State Press on Facebook and follow @statepress on X.
MJ MartinezSenior Reporter
MJ is a senior reporter. She previously worked as a part-time reporter for Sci-Tech.
Continue supporting student journalism and donate to The State Press today.