STOCKHOLM - Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar M. Yaghi were awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in Chemistry on Wednesday for developing metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced.

"The Nobel Prize laureates in chemistry 2025 have created molecular constructions with large spaces through which gases and other chemicals can flow," the academy said in a statement.

It added that these constructions, metal-organic frameworks, can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases or catalyse chemical reactions.

Kitagawa is a professor at Kyoto University in Japan. Robson, born in Britain, works at the University of Melbourne in Australia. Yaghi, born in Amman, Jordan, is a professor at the University of California, Berkeley in the United States.

"MOFs have enormous potential, bringing previously unforeseen opportunities for custom-made materials with new functions," said Heiner Linke, chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry.