Nobel prize in medicine/physiology 2013-2015

Dr. Khushbu S. Soni3rd year residentBiochemistry

The Nobel Prize is a set of annual international awards presented in a number of categories by Swedish and Norwegian committees in recognition of academic, cultural and/or scientific advances.

The will of the Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel established the prizes in 1895. The prizes in Chemistry, Literature, Peace, Physics, and Physiology or Medicine were first awarded in 1901.

Nobel prize in medicine 2013

• The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2013 was awarded jointly to James E. Rothman, Randy W. Schekman and Thomas C. Südhof ,

• "for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells".

James E. Rothman Born: 3 November 1950, Haverhill, MA, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells"

Field: biochemistry, cell physiology

Prize share: 1/3

Mapping of the Cell's Transport System The cells inside our bodies produce a host of different molecules that are

sent to specific sites. During transport, many of these molecules are grouped together in tiny sac-like structures called vesicles.

These vesicles help transport substances to different places inside the cell and send molecules from the cell's surface as signals to other cells in the body.

During the 1980s and 1990s, James Rothman showed how vesicles fuse with specific surfaces in the cell so that transports arrive at the correct destination.

Randy W. Schekman Born: 30 December 1948, St. Paul, MN, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA, Howard Hughes Medical Institute

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells"

Field: cell physiology, genetics

Prize share: 1/3

Mapping of the Cell's Transport System

During the 1970s, Randy Schekman studied yeast cells with malfunctions in this transportation system. He demonstrated that the malfunctions were due to genetic defects and explained how different genes regulate different aspects of the transports.

Thomas C. Südhof Born: 22 December 1955, Göttingen, Germany

Affiliation at the time of the award: Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA, Howard Hughes Medical Institute

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells"

Field: cell physiology, neurophysiology

Prize share: 1/3

Mapping of the Cell's Transport System

By studying brain cells from mice, in the 1990s Thomas Südhof demonstrated how vesicles are held in place, ready to release signal-bearing molecules at the right moment.

Nobel prize in medicine 2014

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2014 was divided, one half awarded to John O'Keefe, the other half jointly to May-Britt Moser and Edward I. Moser,

"for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain".

John O'Keefe Born: 18 November 1939, New York, NY, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: University College, London, United Kingdom

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain"

Field: physiology, spatial behavior

Prize share: 1/2

Discovered the Brain's Positioning System The awareness of one's location and how to find the way to other

places is crucial for both humans and animals. To understand the ability to orient ourselves in space, John O'Keefe

studied the movements of rats and signals from nerve cells in the hippocampus, an area located in the center of the brain.

In 1971 he discovered that when a rat was at a certain location in a room, certain cells were activated, and that when the rat moved to another location, other cells became activated. That is to say, the cells form a kind of internal map of the room.

May-Britt Moser Born: 4 January 1963, Fosnavåg, Norway

Affiliation at the time of the award: Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim, Norway

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain"

Field: physiology, spatial behavior

Prize share: 1/4

Discovered the Brain's Positioning System

In 2005 May-Britt Moser and Edvard I. Moser discovered a type of cell that is important for determining position close to the hippocampus, an area located in the center of the brain.

They found that when a rat passed certain points arranged in a hexagonal grid in space, nerve cells that form a kind of coordinate system for navigation were activated.

They then went on to demonstrate how these different cell types cooperate.

Edward I. Moser Born: 27 April 1962, Ålesund, Norway

Affiliation at the time of the award: Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim, Norway

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain"

Field: physiology, spatial behavior

Prize share: 1/4

Nobel prize in medicine 2015 The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2015 was divided,

one half jointly to William C. Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura,

"for their discoveries concerning a novel therapy against infections caused by roundworm parasites" and

The other half to Youyou Tu "for her discoveries concerning a novel therapy against Malaria".

William C. Campbell Born: 1930, Ramelton, Ireland

Affiliation at the time of the award: Drew University, Madison, NJ, USA

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries concerning a novel therapy against infections caused by roundworm parasites"

Prize share: ¼

William Campbell made the discovery that larval worms can survive freezing at -321 F in liquid nitrogen , this discovery replaced the cumbersome process of constant slaughtering of infected animal to get worms each time.

He also contributed to the discovery of the avermectins.

Satoshi Ōmura Born: 1935, Yamanashi prefektur, Japan

Affiliation at the time of the award: Kitasato University, Tokyo, Japan

Prize motivation: "for their discoveries concerning a novel therapy against infections caused by roundworm parasites"

Prize share: 1/4

Youyou Tu Born: 1930, Zhejiang Ningpo, China

Affiliation at the time of the award: China Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China

Prize motivation: "for her discoveries concerning a novel therapy against Malaria"

Prize share: 1/2

Tu Youyou has been awarded a share of the 2015 Nobel Prize for medicine or physiology for her discovery of artemisinin.

She shared the prize with William C. Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura, whose work led to the development of ivermectin, an important treatment for roundworm parasite diseases.

She and three assistants reviewed more than 2000 recipes for traditional Chinese remedies in the academy’s library. They made 380 herbal extracts and tested them on mice.

One of the compounds did indeed reduce the number of malaria parasites in the blood. It was derived from sweet wormwood (Artemisia annua), a plant common throughout China, which was used in a treatment for “intermittent fevers” – a hallmark of malaria.

“The drug was found in an 1600-year-old recipe titled ‘Emergency Prescriptions Kept Up One’s Sleeve’”

The directions were to soak one bunch of wormwood in water and then drink the juice.

Tu realized that their method of preparation, boiling up the wormwood, might have damaged the active ingredient.

So she made another preparation using an ether solvent, which boils at 35 °C. When tested on mice and monkeys, it proved 100 per cent effective.

In the past decade the first resistance to artemisinin has emerged, in Cambodia. The drug still works but it takes longer, typically four days instead of two.

To stop resistance from spreading further doctors now only use artemisinin in combination with another antimalarial; it is harder for the parasite to evolve resistance to two drugs simultaneously.