AFP UK

Two Americans and a Dane have won the Nobel in chemistry

A trio of chemists from the United States and Denmark who laid the foundation for a more functional form of chemistry where molecules are snapped together on Wednesday won the Nobel Chemistry Prize.

Americans Carolyn Bertozzi and Barry Sharpless, together with Denmark’s Morten Meldal, were honoured “for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry”, the jury said.

Bertozzi is the only woman among the seven Nobel laureates honoured so far this year, with women vastly under-represented in the history of the prizes, especially in the science disciplines.

The chemist — who as an undergraduate at Harvard played keyboards in a band called Bored of Education with future Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello — is only the eighth woman to win a Nobel Chemistry Prize, out of 189 recipients.

The award marks the second Nobel for 81-year-old Sharpless, who won the chemistry Nobel in 2001. 

Only four other individuals have achieved the feat of winning two Nobel Prizes, including Polish-born Frenchwoman Marie Curie, who won the chemistry prize in 1911 after first winning the physics prize in 1903.

She was followed by American Linus Pauling who won for chemistry in 1954 and peace in 1962. American John Bardeen won the physics prize in 1956 and 1972, and Britain’s Frederick Sanger won the chemistry prize in 1958 and 1980.

– To make drugs, map DNA –

Click chemistry “is an elegant and efficient chemical reaction that is now in widespread use,” the jury said in a statement.

“Among many other uses, it is utilised in the development of pharmaceuticals, for mapping DNA and creating materials that are more fit for purpose,” it added.

Sharpless, a professor at Scripps Research in California, “started the ball rolling” and “coined the concept of click chemistry” around 2000, the jury said.

Afterwards, Sharpless and Meldal, a professor at the University of Copenhagen, “independently of each other, presented what is now the crown jewel of click chemistry: the copper catalysed azide-alkyne cycloaddition”.

The process allows chemists to “snap” molecules together like Lego bricks “with the help of some copper ions”, which among other things allow for the production of new materials.

“If a manufacturer adds a clickable azide to a plastic or fibre, changing the material at a later stage is straightforward,” the Nobel committee explained.

It is possible to click in substances that conduct electricity, capture sunlight, are antibacterial, protect from ultraviolet radiation or have other desirable properties, it said.

While there is widespread application of his research, Meldal said he was “very surprised and very proud” to receive the honour.

“There are so many good discoveries and developments in the world, it’s incredible to be in this situation,” Meldal told Swedish public radio.

– ‘A new level’ –

Bertozzi, 55, a professor at Stanford in the United States, was highlighted for then taking “click chemistry to a new level”.

“She developed click reactions that work inside living organisms. Her bioorthogonal reactions take place without disrupting the normal chemistry of the cell,” the jury said.

Her research is now being used to investigate how these reactions can be used to diagnose and treat cancer.

“I’m absolutely stunned, I’m sitting here and I can hardly breathe,” Bertozzi told reporters via telephone, minutes after the announcement.

Silvia Diez-Gonzaleza, a chemist who works on click chemistry at Imperial College, London, welcomed the win.

“Thank goodness” that the days of women not being allowed in chemistry labs are over, she told AFP, though “there is a lot of bias still out there”.

“I want to believe that it’s just a matter of time that as women and non-white people get more opportunities to achieve their potential, then eventually the recognition they get will be spread more widely.”

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, which awards the Nobels in the science disciplines, has refused to introduce quotas despite the dearth of women laureates.

Goran Hansson, then-secretary general of the academy, told AFP last year after all of the science nods went to men, that it wanted every laureate to be accepted “because they made the most important discovery, and not because of gender or ethnicity”. 

The lack of women laureates “reflects the unfair conditions in society, particularly in years past but still existing”, he acknowledged.

This year’s laureates will share the Nobel award sum of 10 million Swedish kronor (more than $910,000), and will receive the prize from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a ceremony in Stockholm on December 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of scientist Alfred Nobel who created the prizes in his last will and testament.

A small group of Nobel winners have won more than once

American Barry Sharpless on Wednesday became only the fifth person ever to win a second Nobel Prize, two decades after being awarded his first.

AFP looks at the four other people who received the illustrious award twice for their services to mankind:

– Marie Curie (1903, 1911) –

The mother of modern physics was the first woman ever to win not one, but two, Nobel prizes for her seminal discoveries in physics and chemistry.

Born Maria Sklodowska in Poland, Curie moved to Paris as a student and is famed for having isolated the elements of polonium and radium as well as for promoting radium to alleviate suffering.

In 1903, she was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics, along with her husband Pierre Curie and French physicist Antoine Henri Becquerel for their research into spontaneous radiation.

A second Nobel followed in 1911, this time for chemistry, when Curie was honoured alone for her work on radioactivity.

– Linus Pauling (1954, 1962) –

Linus Pauling, the US chemist who posited that huge doses of vitamin C can ward off the common cold, is the only person to have been awarded two unshared Nobel Prizes – the 1954 Nobel Prize in Chemistry and the 1962 Nobel Peace Prize.

Pauling won his first Nobel in 1954 for his work in molecular chemistry, particularly in the field of proteins and anti-bodies.

His second award came eight years later in 1962 was in recognition for his campaigning against nuclear testing.

– John Bardeen (1956, 1972) –

US engineer John Bardeen shared the Nobel Prize in Physics twice.

In 1956, he and two colleagues at Bell Labs, William Shockley and Walter Brattain, won for inventing the transistor, which revolutionised the field of electronics by leading to smaller and cheaper radios, calculators and computers, amongst other objects.

In 1972, he picked up his second Nobel for developing the BSC-theory of superconductivity, with fellow American physicists Leon Cooper and John Robert Schrieffer.

– Frederick Sanger (1958, 1980) –

British biochemist Frederick Sanger, dubbed the father of genomics, was the only person to win the chemistry Nobel twice.

Sanger was the sole winner of the prize in 1958 for his work on the structure of proteins, notably insulin, and then shared it with two others, Paul Berg and Walter Gilbert of the United States, in 1980 for pioneering developments in DNA sequencing that are still being used today.

His work allowed long stretches of DNA to be rapidly and accurately sequenced and was central to the Human Genome Project’s mammoth achievement in mapping more than three billion units of human DNA.

– ICRC and UNHCR –

Two organisations have won multiple Nobel Peace Prizes.

The International Committee of the Red Cross won in 1917, 1944 and 1963 and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees won in 1954 and 1981.

Two Americans and a Dane have won the Nobel in chemistry

A trio of chemists from the United States and Denmark who laid the foundation for a more functional form of chemistry where molecules are snapped together on Wednesday won the Nobel Chemistry Prize.

Americans Carolyn Bertozzi and Barry Sharpless, together with Denmark’s Morten Meldal, were honoured “for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry”, the jury said.

Bertozzi is the only woman among the seven Nobel laureates honoured so far this year, with women vastly under-represented in the history of the prizes, especially in the science disciplines.

The award marks the second Nobel for 81-year-old Sharpless, who won the chemistry Nobel in 2001. 

Only four other individuals have achieved the feat of winning two Nobel Prizes, including Polish-born Frenchwoman Marie Curie, who won the chemistry prize in 1911 after first winning the physics prize in 1903.

She was followed by American Linus Pauling who won for chemistry in 1954 and peace in 1962. American John Bardeen won the physics prize in 1956 and 1972, and Britain’s Frederick Sanger won the chemistry prize in 1958 and 1980.

– To make drugs, map DNA –

Click chemistry “is an elegant and efficient chemical reaction that is now in widespread use,” the jury said in a statement.

“Among many other uses, it is utilised in the development of pharmaceuticals, for mapping DNA and creating materials that are more fit for purpose,” it added.

Sharpless, a professor at Scripps Research in California, “started the ball rolling” and “coined the concept of click chemistry” around 2000, the jury said.

Afterwards, Sharpless and Meldal, a professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen, “independently of each other, presented what is now the crown jewel of click chemistry: the copper catalysed azide-alkyne cycloaddition”.

The process allows chemists to “snap” molecules together “with the help of some copper ions,” which among other things allows for the production of new materials.

“If a manufacturer adds a clickable azide to a plastic or fibre, changing the material at a later stage is straightforward,” the Nobel Foundation explained.

It is possible to click in substances that conduct electricity, capture sunlight, are antibacterial, protect from ultraviolet radiation or have other desirable properties, it said.

While there is widespread application of his research, Meldal said he was “very surprised and very proud” to receive the honour.

“There are so many good discoveries and developments in the world, it’s incredible to be in this situation,” Meldal told Swedish public radio.

– ‘A new level’ –

Bertozzi, 55, a professor at Stanford in the United States, was highlighted for then taking “click chemistry to a new level”.

“She developed click reactions that work inside living organisms. Her bioorthogonal reactions take place without disrupting the normal chemistry of the cell,” the jury said.

Her research is now being used to investigate how these reactions can be used to diagnose and treat cancer.

“I’m absolutely stunned, I’m sitting here and I can hardly breathe,” Bertozzi told reporters via telephone, minutes after the announcement.

The trio will share the Nobel award sum of 10 million Swedish kronor (more than $910,000), and will receive the prize from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a formal ceremony in Stockholm on December 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of scientist Alfred Nobel who created the prizes in his last will and testament.

Last year, the academy honoured Germany’s Benjamin List and US-British dual national David MacMillan for their development of a precise tool for molecular construction known as asymmetric organocatalysis.

On Monday, the medicine prize went to Swedish paleogeneticist Svante Paabo for his discoveries on the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution.

Then on Tuesday, physicists Alain Aspect of France, John Clauser of the United States and Austria’s Anton Zeilinger were given the physics prize for developing experimental tools that helped prove quantum entanglement — a phenomenon Albert Einstein dismissed as “spooky action at a distance”.

The chemistry prize will be followed by the highly watched literature and peace prizes, announced on Thursday and Friday respectively.

The peace prize is expected to hold a special significance this year given the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Two Americans and a Dane won the Nobel in chemistry

The Nobel Chemistry Prize was on Wednesday awarded to a trio of chemists from the US and Denmark who laid the foundation for a more functional form of chemistry.

Americans Carolyn Bertozzi and Barry Sharpless, together with Denmark’s Morten Meldal, were honoured “for the development of click chemistry and bioorthogonal chemistry,” the jury said.

The award marks the second Nobel for 81-year-old Sharpless, who won the chemistry Nobel in 2001. 

Only four other individuals have achieved the feat, including Polish-born Frenchwoman Marie Curie.

Click chemistry “is an elegant and efficient chemical reaction that is now in widespread use,” the jury said in a statement.

“Among many other uses, it is utilised in the development of pharmaceuticals, for mapping DNA and creating materials that are more fit for purpose,” it added.

“This year’s Prize in Chemistry deals with not overcomplicating matters, instead working with what is easy and simple,” Johan Aqvist, Chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry, said in the statement.

The trio will share the Nobel award sum of 10 million Swedish kronor ($917,500), will receive the prize from King Carl XVI Gustaf at a formal ceremony in Stockholm on December 10, the anniversary of the 1896 death of scientist Alfred Nobel who created the prizes in his last will and testament.

– Click chemistry –

Sharpless, a professor at Scripps Research in California, “started the ball rolling” and “coined the concept of click chemistry” around 2000, the jury said.

“Shortly afterwards, Morten Meldal and Barry Sharpless –- independently of each other –- presented what is now the crown jewel of click chemistry: the copper catalysed azide-alkyne cycloaddition,” the jury said.

Meldal, 68, is a professor of chemistry at the University of Copenhagen.

Bertozzi, who is a professor at Stanford in the United States, then took it to “a new level.”

“She developed click reactions that work inside living organisms. Her bioorthogonal reactions take place without disrupting the normal chemistry of the cell,” the jury said.

“I’m absolutely stunned, I’m sitting here and I can hardly breathe,” Bertozzi told reporters via telephone, minutes after the announcement.

Last year, the academy honoured Germany’s Benjamin List and US-British dual national David MacMillan for their development of a precise tool for molecular construction known as asymmetric organocatalysis.

On Monday, the medicine prize went to Swedish paleogeneticist Svante Paabo for his discoveries on the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution.

Then on Tuesday, physicists Alain Aspect of France, John Clauser of the United States and Austria’s Anton Zeilinger were given the physics prize for developing experimental tools that helped prove quantum entanglement — a phenomenon Albert Einstein dismissed as “spooky action at a distance”.

The chemistry prize will be followed by the highly watched literature and peace prizes, announced on Thursday and Friday respectively.

The peace prize is expected to hold a special significance this year given the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

African countries say they see little chance of a fast transition from fossil fuels — the backbone of their energy supply and, for exporters, a crucial revenue source

Africa needs time and money to wean itself off fossil fuels in order to achieve net zero without jeopardising its future, its representatives are warning ahead of next month’s climate talks.

At energy conferences this week, Ghana, South Africa and the African Union have insisted the continent stands by net zero — the goal of an overall balance in heat-stoking greenhouse gases.

But they warned that the continent was still heavily dependent on coal, oil and gas to power its development.

“Africa is fully convinced and committed to a net zero and supportive of the climate agenda, however. where we may differ is on the timeframe,” African Union (AU) energy commissioner Amani Abou-Zeid told AFP on the sidelines of the Green Energy Africa Summit in Cape Town.

Africa’s population of 1.3 billion is set to double by 2050, and AU nations aim to make affordable and reliable energy available to everyone by 2063, she argued. 

Funding for Africa’s green transition is likely to be a flashpoint at the COP27 climate summit, running in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh from November 6-18.

Under the 2015 Paris Agreement, rich nations pledged $100 billion a year to help developing countries limit climate change. 

But they have so far failed to meet the promise — and prospects have been further clouded this year by the resounding economic impacts from the Covid-19 pandemic and war in Ukraine.

– ‘Not in our interest’ –

Ghana’s deputy energy minister Mohammed Amin Adam said international green energy investment in Africa was “still appalling”, accounting only for about two percent of the global total. 

At the same time, African countries also need to secure financing for oil and gas projects, as fossil fuel revenue is needed to finance climate adaptation measures, he told AFP. 

Adam pointed to data showing that most of Africa’s oil and gas producers depended greatly on export revenue derived by these fuels.

“If we give up this, how do we even finance our ability to adapt to the climate effects? We cannot. Unless we have a substitute for our revenue,” he said. 

African countries are among the most exposed to the impacts of climate change, especially worsening droughts and floods, but responsible for only around three percent of global CO2 emissions, former UN chief Ban Ki-moon said last month.

– S.African coal –

Speaking at an Africa Oil Week event in Cape Town, South African Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe said ditching coal too quickly was not in the country’s best interests, as it would damage the economy and cost thousands of jobs. 

South Africa is the continent’s main coal producer and consumer — as well as one of the world’s top 12 carbon emitters. 

Last year, the government secured pledges of $8.5 billion loans and grants from a group of rich nations to finance the transition to greener alternatives.

But the deal is hanging in the balance, amid fraught negotiations with donor countries around how the money should be spent.

“When developed economies come to us and say ‘part of the $8.5 billion is going to be spent on accelerating the exit of coal’, I feel that is not in our interest,” Mantashe said. 

At pre-COP27 talks in Kinshasa this week, the Democratic Republic of Congo fended off demands to abandon oil and gas blocks that it has put up for auction in environmentally sensitive areas.

The DRC launched bids in July for 30 blocks in the Congo Basin, sparking fears that drilling could release carbon dioxide trapped for millennia in the peaty forest floor. 

But DRC Environment Minister Eve Bazaiba, opening the talks on Monday, asked if the government should let children die rather than harvest from its fossil resources. 

“As much as we need oxygen, we also need bread,” she said.

Blast-off for the SpaceX Crew5 mission is set for noon from the Kennedy Space Center, with the weather forecast so far promising

The United States will on Wednesday carry a Russian to the International Space Station aboard a SpaceX ship, in a voyage that carries symbolic significance amid the Ukraine war.

Anna Kikina, the only female cosmonaut in service, is part of the Crew-5 mission, which also includes one Japanese and two American astronauts.

Blast-off is set for noon from the Kennedy Space Center, with the weather forecast so far promising.

Two weeks ago, an American astronaut took off on a Russian Soyuz rocket for the orbital platform.

The long-planned astronaut exchange program has been maintained despite soaring tensions between the two countries since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February.

Ensuring the operation of the ISS has become one of the few remaining areas of cooperation between the United States and Russia.

“When you each are flying other’s crew members, you know that you have a huge responsibility that you’re promising to the other country,” NASA associate administrator Kathy Lueders told reporters in a recent press conference.

“At a working level, we really appreciated the constancy in the relationship, even during some really, really tough times geopolitically.”

– Fifth female cosmonaut – 

Kikina, 38 and an engineer by training, will become the fifth Russian female professional cosmonaut to go into space.

“I hope in the near future we have more women in the cosmonaut corps,” the Novosibirsk native told AFP in August.

The Soviet Union put the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova, in 1963, nearly 20 years before the first American woman Sally Ride. Since then, America has flown dozens more women.

It will also be the first spaceflight for American astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, but the fifth for Japan’s Koichi Wakata.

After a journey of about 30 hours, their ship will dock with the station on Thursday, ready to begin a five-month science mission and relieve the four members of Crew-4, who will stay a few days for handover.

Crew-5’s arrival will bring the total number of astronauts on the ISS to 11, including two other Russians and an American who arrived on the recent Soyuz.

– ISS future unclear – 

Kikina will be the first Russian to fly with Elon Musk’s SpaceX which, along with Boeing, has a “taxi service” contract with NASA.

Musk himself waded into the conflict Thursday by proposing a peace deal that involved re-running, under UN supervision, annexation referendums in Moscow-occupied regions of Ukraine and acknowledging Russian sovereignty over the Crimean peninsula. 

The post enraged Ukrainians, including the country’s envoy to Germany, who responded with an expletive. 

Tensions between Moscow and Washington have increased considerably in the space field after the announcement of American sanctions against the Russian aerospace industry, in response to the invasion of Ukraine.

Russia thus announced this summer that it wanted to leave the ISS “after 2024” in favor of creating its own station, albeit without setting a precise date.

The director of manned flights at Roscosmos, Sergei Krikaliov, declared Monday he hoped the Russian government agrees to extend participation in the ISS after 2024.

The United States, for its part, wants to continue operating until at least 2030, then transition to commercially run stations.

As things stand, the ISS cannot function without joint cooperation, as the US side is responsible for power and life support and the Russian side for propulsion and maintaining orbit.

Between 2011 — when the Space Shuttle program ended — and SpaceX’s first flight to the ISS in 2020, the United States was dependent on Russia for flying its crew to the station, paying tens of millions of dollars per seat.

The loss of this monopoly represents a significant income reduction for the Russian space program. The current crew exchange program, by contrast, is a barter-based agreement with no exchange of money.

Pieter Cullis, Drew Weissman and Katalin Kariko are thought to be among the favourites for the Nobel Chemistry Prize

The development of mRNA vaccines, “bioorthogonal chemistry” or even artificial skin are some of the discoveries tipped for the Nobel Chemistry Prize announced Wednesday, which experts see as a toss-up.

The winner — or winners — of the prestigious award will be unveiled at 11:45 am (0945 GMT) “at the earliest” by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm. 

Last year, the academy honoured Germany’s Benjamin List and US-British dual national David MacMillan for their development of a precise tool for molecular construction known as asymmetric organocatalysis.

Thought to be among the favourites for the medicine prize that was announced on Monday — which went to Swedish paleogeneticist Svante Paabo — the pioneers of the Covid-19 mRNA vaccines could see their work instead snatching the chemistry category.

Hungarian biochemist Katalin Kariko and US immunologist Drew Weissman — whose work served as a basis for the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna Covid-19 mRNA vaccines — are also favourites for the chemistry prize.

They could be honoured alongside Canada’s Pieter Cullis, another mRNA expert.

– Long wait –

While many hope to see the mRNA vaccines, of which billions of doses have already been administered, receive a Nobel Prize, it is unlikely, according to Linus Brohult, editor of the science desk at Swedish public broadcaster SVT.

“Nobel committees tend to wait a long time before awarding a prize,” he told AFP.

Brohult also noted that mRNA vaccines are under development and could be used in other fields such as cancer prevention.

“mRNA vaccines might be an even bigger thing in a few years, and then they will want to include those who have been part of that development,” Brohult said. 

While under-represented among Nobel science prizes, and after no woman was crowned in the science categories last year, experts queried by AFP nonetheless cite a number of female researchers as potential Nobel candidates, including Kariko.

David Pendlebury, head of research analysis at the Institute for Scientific Information at Clarivate — an organisation which closely monitors potential science laureates — said American Carolyn Bertozzi was a likely winner for chemistry this year. 

Pendlebury told AFP that “she coined the term and helped develop what is today known as bioorthogonal chemistry,” which refers to chemical reactions occurring inside of living systems without interfering with biochemical processes.

Bertozzi could potentially share the prize with American Stephen J. Lippard, an expert in the role of metal ions in biology, which for instance is used in the development of cancer treatments.

Brohult also thinks American molecular biologist Bonnie Bassler, a specialist in intercellular communication, has a good chance of earning a Nobel medal this year. 

– Artificial skin –

Stanford University chemical engineering professor Zhenan Bao could also be awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry, according to Brohult.

The Chinese-American and her team have invented an “artificial electronic skin” by developing materials for stretchable circuits and flexible batteries.

Another skin-related field that may get the nod is that of tissue engineering thanks to the American trio of Cato Laurencin, Kristi Anseth and Robert Langer. 

The latter is known for developing technologies that allow the delivery of drugs directly to diseased tissues without the use of needles or other invasive measures.

One man believed to be in the race is American Barry Sharpless, who is also in a position to achieve the rare feat of grabbing a second Nobel after first winning in 2001.

Not counting organisations, only four people have done so, starting with Polish-born Frenchwoman Marie Curie.

He could be awarded the prize for so-called “click” chemistry, a term he coined which refers to the use of molecules that are easily joined together.

Also speculated to be in the running in recent years are Japan’s Susumu Kitagawa and Makoto Fujita and American-Jordanian Omar Yaghi, considered to be pioneers of metal-organic frameworks which allow for the storage of large quantities of gas without requiring high pressure.

On Monday, the medicine prize went to Paabo for his discoveries on the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution.

Then on Tuesday, physicists Alain Aspect of France, John Clauser of the United States and Austria’s Anton Zeilinger were given the physics prize for developing experimental tools that helped prove quantum entanglement — a phenomenon Albert Einstein dismissed as “spooky action at a distance”.

The chemistry prize will be followed by the highly watched literature and peace prizes, announced on Thursday and Friday respectively.

The peace prize is expected to hold a special significance this year given the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

At least 13 dead southern right whales have appeared on the coast of the Golfo Nuevo and Peninsula Valdez sanctuary, in Chile's northern Patagonia

A string of whale deaths in recent days in southern Argentina have worried scientists, who think a micro-algae could be to blame.

From September 24 to October 2, at least 13 southern right whales died in the Nuevo Gulf close to the Valdes Peninsula in Argentine Patagonia, an area that is a sanctuary and breeding ground for the huge mammals, the Whale Conservation Institute (ICB) said.

Authorities have started performing autopsies on the whales that have been recovered and have begun testing the water and mollusks “to determine the presence of possible biotoxins linked to the proliferation of harmful algal blooms known as red tides,” said whale program coordinator Agustina Donini in an ICB statement released Monday.

None of the whales observed so far have displayed any signs of injuries or trauma, and all were well-fed, the ICB said.

The deaths come at a time when authorities have been celebrating a 50-year-high number of cetaceans for the season in an area that attracts whale watching tourists.

The large number of dead whales in such a short space of time suggests that “a local environmental variable” is to blame, said Marcella Uhart, another whale program director

Algal blooms produce natural toxins that can be harmful to other organisms living in the water.

Their pigment can make the surface of the water look red, giving the phenomenon the name “red tide.”

Fabian Gandon, mayor of the nearby town of Puerto Piramides, told reporters there had been “an unusual increase in… red tides” in the Nuevo and San Jose gulfs.

The local population has been advised to avoid eating mollusks, which can store the toxins created by the algal blooms.

Despite the recent deaths, authorities have recorded more than 1,400 whales in the Nuevo and San Jose gulfs, the largest number in more than 50 years.

At least 13 dead southern right whales have appeared on the coast of the Golfo Nuevo and Peninsula Valdez sanctuary, in Chile's northern Patagonia

A string of whale deaths in recent days in southern Argentina have worried scientists, who think a micro-algae could be to blame.

From September 24 to October 2, at least 13 southern right whales died in the Nuevo Gulf close to the Valdes Peninsula in Argentine Patagonia, an area that is a sanctuary and breeding ground for the huge mammals, the Whale Conservation Institute (ICB) said.

Authorities have started performing autopsies on the whales that have been recovered and have begun testing the water and mollusks “to determine the presence of possible biotoxins linked to the proliferation of harmful algal blooms known as red tides,” said whale program coordinator Agustina Donini in an ICB statement released Monday.

None of the whales observed so far have displayed any signs of injuries or trauma, and all were well-fed, the ICB said.

The deaths come at a time when authorities have been celebrating a 50-year-high number of cetaceans for the season in an area that attracts whale watching tourists.

The large number of dead whales in such a short space of time suggests that “a local environmental variable” is to blame, said Marcella Uhart, another whale program director

Algal blooms produce natural toxins that can be harmful to other organisms living in the water.

Their pigment can make the surface of the water look red, giving the phenomenon the name “red tide.”

Fabian Gandon, mayor of the nearby town of Puerto Piramides, told reporters there had been “an unusual increase in… red tides” in the Nuevo and San Jose gulfs.

The local population has been advised to avoid eating mollusks, which can store the toxins created by the algal blooms.

Despite the recent deaths, authorities have recorded more than 1,400 whales in the Nuevo and San Jose gulfs, the largest number in more than 50 years.