Prestigious Prize Honors Pioneering Immune System Research

This year's prestigious award in medical science has been granted for transformative discoveries that illuminate how the body's defense network targets dangerous pathogens while sparing the body's own cells.

A trio of esteemed scientists—from Japan Prof. Sakaguchi and American experts Dr. Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—received this honor.

Their work identified specialized "security guards" within the immune system that remove malfunctioning immune cells capable of attacking the body.

These findings are now paving the way for new treatments for immune disorders and cancer.

These winners will divide a prize fund valued at 11m SEK.

Decisive Findings

"The research has been essential for understanding how the body's defenses operates and the reason we do not all suffer from severe autoimmune diseases," commented the head of the Nobel Committee.

The team's research address a fundamental question: How does the defense system protect us from numerous infections while leaving our own tissues intact?

Our body's protection system uses white blood cells that search for indicators of infection, including viruses and germs it has not met before.

These defenders employ detectors—called recognition units—that are produced randomly in a vast number of combinations.

This gives the immune system the capacity to fight a wide array of threats, but the randomness of the mechanism unavoidably creates white blood cells that may target the body.

Security Guards of the Immune System

Researchers earlier knew that a portion of these harmful defense cells were destroyed in the thymus—the site where immune cells develop.

The latest Nobel Prize honors the discovery of regulatory T-cells—known as the immune system's "security guards"—which patrol the system to neutralize any immune cells that assault the healthy cells.

It is known that this process malfunctions in self-attack conditions such as juvenile diabetes, MS, and RA.

The prize committee added, "The findings have laid the foundation for a new field of research and spurred the creation of innovative treatments, for instance for cancer and immune disorders."

Regarding cancer, regulatory T-cells prevent the body from attacking the tumor, so studies are aimed at reducing their numbers.

In self-attack disorders, trials are testing increasing T-reg cells so the body is not under attack. A comparable approach could also be useful in reducing the chances of transplanted organ failure.

Pioneering Experiments

Professor Sakaguchi, of a Japanese institution, performed experiments on mice that had their immune gland extracted, leading to autoimmune disease.

The researcher showed that injecting immune cells from other mice could stop the disease—implying there was a mechanism for blocking defenders from harming the host.

Mary Brunkow, from the a research center in Seattle, and Fred Ramsdell, currently at a biotech firm in San Francisco, were studying an inherited immune disorder in rodents and humans that resulted in the discovery of a gene critical for how T-regs function.

"The groundbreaking work has revealed how the immune system is kept in check by T-reg cells, stopping it from accidentally attacking the healthy cells," said a leading physiology expert.

"The work is a striking illustration of how basic physiological study can have broad implications for public health."