20 March 2023: Who was Dr. Mario Molina and what were his accomplishments ? Read to know more.
Google celebrated the 80th birthday of Dr. Mario Molina, a Mexican chemist who managed to persuade governments to work together to save the earth's natural ozone layer, on March 19 with a doodle displaying his accomplishments.
Dr. Mario José Molina Henríquez, a co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1995, was one of the researchers who revealed how chemical compounds dry up the Earth's ozone cover, which is essential for safeguarding humans, plants, and wildlife from harmful ultraviolet radiation.
He was born on March 19, 1943, in Mexico City, and was so interested in science that he converted his bathroom into a makeshift laboratory.
Google thanked Dr. Molina for his crucial scientific breakthroughs and stated that the planet's ozone layer is on track to make a full recovery in the coming decades.
“Thank you, Dr. Molina, for your years of research that truly changed the world,” a Google blog read.
A little about Dr. Molina :
He obtained a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from Mexico's National Autonomous University and an advanced education from Germany's University of Freiburg. He moved to the United States after finishing his studies to perform postdoctoral research at the University of California, Berkeley, and subsequently at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Picture source: wikipedia
Dr. Molina began studying the effects of synthetic chemicals on the Earth's atmosphere in the early 1970s. He was among the first to notice that chlorofluorocarbons were depleting ozone and allowing ultraviolet rays to reach the Earth's surface.
His research team's results, which were published in the journal Nature, went on to earn them the 1995 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. The internationally approved Montreal Protocol, which successfully outlawed the production of roughly 100 ozone-depleting substances, was built on the framework of the ground-breaking research.
Molina, 77, passed away in Mexico on October 7, 2020, after succumbing to a heart attack. The Mario Molina Center, a major research institute in Mexico, carries his research and continues its efforts to make the world more sustainable and environment friendly.
