Shinya Yamanaka of Japan and John Gurdon of Britain won the Nobel Prize yesterday for work in cell programming, a frontier that has raised dreams of growing replacement tissue for people crippled by disease.
Specialised cells can turn back the developmental clock
The two scientists were lauded for determining that adult cells can be transformed back to an infant, versatile state called stem cells.
“Their findings have revolutionised our understanding of how cells and organisms develop,” the Nobel jury declared.
By reprogramming human cells, “scientists have created new opportunities to study diseases and develop methods for diagnosis and therapy,” it added.
Stem cells are precursor cells which differentiate into the various organs of the body.
They have stirred huge excitement, with hopes that they can be coaxed into growing into replacement tissue for victims of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other diseases.
Gurdon’s achievement in 1962 was to discover that the DNA code in the nucleus of an adult frog cell held all the information to develop into every kind of cell.
This meant that an adult cell could in essence be reprogrammed.
His landmark discovery was initially met with scepticism, as the journey from immature to pecialised cell was previously deemed irreversible.
But his theory eventually became accepted when it was confirmed by other scientists.
More than four decades later, in 2006, Yamanaka discovered how mature cells in mice could in fact be turned back to their youthful state.
The advantage of this would be to avert the need to use stem cells taken from early-stage embryos. These are hugely versatile but have stirred ethical controversy.
Stem-cell research is still at a very early stage, and only a tiny number of human trials have taken place.
“The discoveries of professors Gurdon and Yamanaka have shown that specialised cells can turn back the developmental clock under certain circumstances,” the committee said.
“For instance, skin cells can be obtained from patients with various diseases, reprogrammed, and examined in the laboratory to determine how they differ from cells of healthy individuals,” it said.
Gurdon, 79, is currently at the Gurdon Institute in Cambridge, while Yamanaka, 50, lectures at Kyoto University in Japan.
Because of the economic crisis, the Nobel Foundation has slashed the prize sum to €930,000 per award, down from the €1.1 million awarded since 2001.
Last year, the honour went to Bruce Beutler of the US, Jules Hoffmann of France and Ralph Steinman of Canada, for their groundbreaking work on the immune system. This year’s laureates will receive their prize at a formal ceremony in Stockholm on December 10.
Recent winners
2012: Shinya Yamanaka (Japan) and John B. Gurdon (Britain)
2011: Bruce Beutler (the US), Jules Hoffmann (France) and Ralph Steinman (Canada)
2010: Robert G. Edwards (Britain)
2009: Carol Greider and Jack Szostak (the US), Elizabeth Blackburn (Australia-US)
2008: Francoise Barre-Sinoussi and Luc Montagnier (France), Harald zur Hausen (Germany)
2007: Mario Capecchi (the US), Oliver Smithies (the US), and Martin Evans (Britain)
2006: Andrew Z. Fire (the US), Craig C. Mello (US)
2005: Barry J. Marshall (Australia), J. Robin Warren (Australia)
2004: Richard Axel (the US), Linda B. Buck (the US)
2003: Paul C. Lauterbur (the US) and Peter Mansfield (Britain)
A look at the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine
Right: Rita Levi-Montalcini won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1986.• The 2012 prize was awarded “for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent”. The two scientists discovered that mature, specialised cells can be reprogrammed to become immature cells capable of developing into all tissues of the body. Their findings revolutionised understanding of how cells and organisms develop.
• Nobel Prizes in Physiology or Medicine have been awarded 102 times since 1901. In all but 38 cases they were given to more than one recipient.
• Of the 199 individuals awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, only 10 are women. Of these eight, Barabara McClintock is the only one who has received an unshared Nobel Prize.
• Famous Winners: Robert Koch, the German physician and bacteriologist, won in 1905 for his work on tuberculosis; Frederick Banting, the Canadian physiologist who with his assistant Charles Best discovered insulin, the principal remedy for diabetes, won the prize in 1923.
• The oldest living recipient is Rita Levi-Montalcini, the first Nobel laureate to reach her 100th birthday, who won the prize in 1986 with Stanley Cohen for their discoveries of growth factors. She celebrated her 103rd birthday last April.
(Reuters, nobelprize.org, Chambers Biographical Dictionary)