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Maar ook omdat ze via de Nobelprijs-website op hun telefoon proberen te horen wat Feringa zegt. Dan verschijnt Feringa, en een luid gejuich en applaus barst los. Emeritus hoogleraar chemie Jan Engberts, nestor van de afdeling, spreekt Feringa kort toe en feliciteert hem: ‘We hadden er allemaal op gehoopt, nu is het werkelijkheid.’ Dan neemt Feringa zelf het woord: ‘I am deeply honoured’, zegt hij.
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About fifteen minutes after the announcement, the corridor outside Feringa’s second floor office is crowded. His entire department appears to be there, most of them with huge grins on their faces. As of today, they are working in the lab of a Nobel Laureate. However, the Laureate is nowhere to be seen. He is inside his office, on the phone, talking live to the press in Stockholm. When the excited noises in the hall become a bit too loud, people hiss ‘quiet!’, so as not to disturb him. They want quiet as they are listening to what he’s saying through the Nobel website on their smartphones. Then Feringa appears, and a huge cheer goes up and applause erupts. Emeritus professor Jan Engberts, the Nestor of the Institute, congratulates him with a short speech. ‘We all hoped for this, and now it has become reality’. Then, Ben Feringa addresses the crowd. ‘I am deeply honoured’, he says, the emotion audible in his voice.
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