Ei-ichi Negishi, Nobel-winning chemist who made ‘art in a test tube,’ dies at 85

Ei-ichi Negishi, a Japanese chemist who won the Nobel Prize for pioneering a precise and efficient technique to build complex organic molecules, paving the way for the development of new drugs and electronic devices, died June 6 at a hospital in Indianapolis. He was 85.

Dr. Negishi spent most of his career at Purdue University in Indiana, which announced his death but did not give a precise cause. He died two days after another Nobel-winning chemist, Richard Ernst, who laid the groundwork for MRI exams.