🔗 Share this article

This year's prestigious award in Physiology or Medicine was granted for revolutionary discoveries that illuminate how the body's defense network attacks harmful infections while sparing the healthy tissues.

Three esteemed scientists—from Japan Prof. Sakaguchi and American scientists Dr. Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—share this accolade.

The research identified unique "sentinels" within the immune system that remove malfunctioning defense cells capable of attacking the body.

The findings are now enabling new treatments for autoimmune diseases and malignancies.

These winners will share a prize fund valued at 11 million SEK.

Decisive Discoveries

"Their research has been decisive for understanding how the body's defenses functions and why we don't all develop severe self-attack conditions," commented the chair of the Nobel Committee.

The trio's studies address a core mystery: How does the immune system defend us from countless infections while leaving our healthy cells unharmed?

The immune system employs immune cells that search for indicators of infection, including pathogens and bacteria it has never encountered.

Such cells employ sensors—known as receptors—that are generated by chance in countless variations.

That provides the immune system the ability to combat a wide array of invaders, but the unpredictability of the process unavoidably creates immune cells that may target the body.

Protectors of the Immune System

Researchers previously understood that some of these problematic white blood cells were eliminated in the immune organ—where white blood cells develop.

The latest award honors the discovery of regulatory T-cells—described as the immune system's "peacekeepers"—which travel through the system to neutralize other immune cells that assault the healthy cells.

It is known that this process fails in self-attack conditions such as juvenile diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and RA.

A Nobel panel added, "The findings have laid the foundation for a new field of research and accelerated the creation of innovative treatments, for example for tumors and immune disorders."

In cancer, regulatory T-cells block the body from attacking the tumor, so research are aimed at lowering their numbers.

In self-attack disorders, trials are testing increasing regulatory T-cells so the body is no longer under attack. A similar approach could also be effective in reducing the chances of transplanted organ rejection.

Innovative Studies

Professor Sakaguchi, from a Japanese institution, conducted tests on rodents that had their immune gland extracted, leading to self-attack conditions.

The researcher showed that introducing defense cells from healthy animals could stop the disease—implying there was a system for blocking defenders from harming the host.

Dr. Brunkow, affiliated with the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Fred Ramsdell, currently at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco, were investigating an inherited autoimmune disease in rodents and people that led to the discovery of a genetic factor critical for how regulatory T-cells function.

"Their pioneering research has uncovered how the immune system is controlled by T-reg cells, preventing it from accidentally attacking the healthy cells," commented a prominent physiology expert.

"The work is a remarkable illustration of how fundamental physiological study can have far-reaching consequences for human health."