Prestigious Prize Recognizes Groundbreaking Body's Defenses Research
This year's prestigious award in Physiology or Medicine has been granted for revolutionary findings that illuminate how the immune system targets harmful infections while protecting the body's own cells.
A trio of renowned scientists—Japan's Shimon Sakaguchi and US experts Mary Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—share this accolade.
Their research identified specialized "security guards" within the defense system that eliminate rogue immune cells capable of harming the organism.
These discoveries are now paving the way for innovative therapies for autoimmune diseases and cancer.
The laureates will divide a prize fund valued at 11m SEK.
Crucial Discoveries
"The work has been essential for comprehending how the body's defenses functions and why we do not all develop serious self-attack conditions," stated the chair of the award panel.
The team's studies explain a fundamental mystery: How does the immune system defend us from numerous invaders while leaving our healthy cells unharmed?
The body's protection system uses immune cells that search for signs of disease, even pathogens and germs it has never encountered.
Such cells utilize sensors—called receptors—that are generated by chance in countless combinations.
This provides the immune system the capacity to combat a broad range of threats, but the randomness of the mechanism inevitably produces immune cells that may target the host.
Protectors of the Body
Researchers previously knew that some of these problematic white blood cells were eliminated in the thymus—where white blood cells mature.
This year's Nobel Prize honors the discovery of regulatory T-cells—described as the immune system's "security guards"—which patrol the body to disarm any immune cells that assault the body's own tissues.
It is known that this mechanism fails in self-attack conditions such as type-1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis.
The Nobel panel added, "These findings have laid the foundation for a novel area of research and accelerated the creation of new therapies, for example for cancer and immune disorders."
In cancer, regulatory T-cells prevent the body from attacking the tumor, so studies are focused on lowering their quantity.
In self-attack disorders, experiments are testing boosting T-reg cells so the body is no longer under attack. A similar approach could also be effective in reducing the chances of organ transplant rejection.
Pioneering Experiments
Prof Shimon Sakaguchi, of Osaka University, performed experiments on mice that had their thymus removed, leading to autoimmune disease.
He showed that introducing defense cells from other animals could prevent the disease—implying there was a system for blocking immune cells from attacking the body.
Dr. Brunkow, affiliated with the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Fred Ramsdell, now at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in a California city, were studying an inherited autoimmune disease in rodents and people that led to the identification of a gene critical for how T-regs operate.
"The pioneering work has uncovered how the immune system is kept in check by T-reg cells, preventing it from mistakenly targeting the healthy cells," said a leading physiology specialist.
"This work is a remarkable illustration of how basic biological study can have far-reaching consequences for public health."
