WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — A graduate from West Lafayette High School has earned a Nobel Prize.

According to a Facebook post from the West Lafayette Schools Education Foundation, Dr. Moungi Bawendi, a 1978 graduate of West Lafayette High School, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry on Wednesday.

Bawendi, the Lester Wolfe Professor of Chemistry at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was awarded the prize along with Louis Brus of Columbia University and Alexei Ekimov of Nanocrystals Technology Inc., according to previous reports.

According to a news release from MIT, Bawendi is a leader in the development of quantum dots. Bawendi, along with Brus and Ekimov, were honored for their work in discovering and synthesizing quantum dots, which they describe as tiny particles of matter that “emit exceptionally pure light.” The Nobel Foundation said Bawendi “revolutionized the chemical production of quantum dots, resulting in almost perfect particles.”

Officials with the foundation said that Bawendi was inducted into the West Lafayette Wall of Pride in 2022.