🔗 Share this article

This year's prestigious award in medical science has been awarded for transformative findings that illuminate how the immune system targets harmful pathogens while protecting the body's own cells.

Three renowned researchers—from Japan Prof. Sakaguchi and American experts Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell—share this accolade.

The work uncovered specialized "security guards" within the immune system that remove rogue immune cells that could harming the organism.

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

The winners will share a monetary award valued at 11m Swedish kronor.

Decisive Findings

"Their work has been essential for understanding how the body's defenses operates and why we do not all suffer from severe self-attack conditions," commented the head of the award panel.

The team's studies address a core mystery: How does the defense system defend us from countless infections while keeping our healthy cells intact?

The body's protection system employs white blood cells that search for signs of disease, even pathogens and bacteria it has not met before.

These defenders employ detectors—known as recognition units—that are produced by chance in a vast number of variations.

This provides the defense network the ability to fight a wide array of invaders, but the randomness of the process unavoidably produces immune cells that can attack the host.

Protectors of the Body

Scientists previously knew that a portion of these harmful defense cells were eliminated in the immune organ—where white blood cells develop.

This year's Nobel Prize honors the identification of regulatory T-cells—described as the immune system's "security guards"—which travel through the system to disarm any immune cells that attack the body's own tissues.

It is known that this mechanism malfunctions in autoimmune diseases such as juvenile diabetes, MS, and RA.

A Nobel panel stated, "These discoveries have established a new field of research and spurred the development of innovative therapies, for example for cancer and autoimmune diseases."

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

For autoimmune diseases, experiments are exploring increasing T-reg cells so the organism is no longer under attack. A comparable approach could also be useful in reducing the risks of organ transplant rejection.

Pioneering Experiments

Professor Shimon Sakaguchi, of a Japanese institution, conducted tests on rodents that had their immune gland removed, causing autoimmune disease.

The researcher demonstrated that introducing immune cells from healthy animals could stop the illness—implying there was a system for preventing defenders from harming the host.

Dr. Brunkow, from the a research center in a US city, and Dr. Ramsdell, currently at a biotech firm in a California city, were studying an genetic immune disorder in rodents and humans that resulted in the discovery of a genetic factor critical for the way regulatory T-cells function.

"Their pioneering research has revealed how the body's defenses is kept in check by T-reg cells, stopping it from mistakenly targeting the healthy cells," commented a leading biological science expert.

"This work is a striking illustration of how basic biological research can have broad consequences for public health."