Most plastics are polymers, substances whose molecules repeat their structure regularly. They were once believed to be high-quality insulators that, unlike metals, do not conduct electricity. Shirakawa and his colleagues discovered, however, that by changing their molecular structure plastics could be made electrically conductive. At the end of the 1970s, they succeeded in chemically treating a plastic film called polyacetylene and making it conductive. Following this, the field of conductive plastics evolved into an important research field among physicists as well as chemists.
Conductive plastics have many advantages over metals.
They are extremely pliable, can be shaped easily, and have a variety of applications. In selecting the recipients, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences stressed that the discovery of conductive polymers will undoubtedly revolutionize the field of molecular electronics. It may also, it added, pave the way for the production of transistors and other electronic components made of single molecules, which will dramatically increase the speed of computer operations and reduce the size of such machines to that of a wristwatch. Shirakawa was born in Tokyo on August 20, 1936. After graduating from the Tokyo Institute of Technology with a degree in chemical engineering in 1961, he enrolled in the graduate program there and received his doctorate in engineering in 1966.