When scientists Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal and Barry Sharpless won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Chemistry Wednesday for discovering reactions that let molecules snap together like legos to create new compounds offering insight into cell biology, scientists including cannabis chemists, rejoiced.
Just ask Dr. Raphael Mechoulam, an organic chemist known as the “father of cannabis research” who is responsible for isolating tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), one of the 113 known cannabinoids found in the cannabis plant and its main psychoactive constituent. Mechoulam, a professor of Medicinal Chemistry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, is credited with jumpstarting the medical marijuana revolution, which set off the debate around cannabis in general and enhanced the lives of so many people who now are benefitting from it.
