Trio win Nobel prize for research on cells
THREE researchers from the US and Britain on Monday shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine for research into how human cells sense and adapt to changing oxygen levels, opening up new strategies to fight common diseases such as cancer and anaemia.
William Kaelin and Gregg Semenza of the US and Britain’s Peter Ratcliffe are to split the nine million Swedish kronor ($914,000) award.
While the fact that humans need oxygen to survive has been understood for centuries, how the body registers and responds to oxygen was little known prior to the trio’s pioneering work.
“They established the basis for our understanding of how oxygen levels affect cellular metabolism and physiological function,” the jury said.
Randall Johnson, a member of the Nobel committee, described the scientists’ discoveries as a switch that ensures the body always has the right level of oxygen.
“The prize is for this . . . rheostat or thermostat of the oxygen levels – a damper that you’d have on your furnace to let in more or less oxygen at any given time so that it’s just right, so that the flame burns just right,” Johnson told the Washington Post.
Semenza studied a gene known as EPO which causes the body to create more red blood cells and isolated the specific DNA segments that help it to adapt to low oxygen levels.
Radcliffe and Semenza then applied this knowledge to show that the oxygen sensing mechanism was present in virtually all human tissues.
Kaelin identified another gene present in patients with a genetic disorder that puts them at far greater risk of certain cancers. The gene rewires the body’s ability to prevent the onset of cancer, and it plays a key role in how cancer cells respond to low oxygen levels.
Their work has shed new light on the specific, cell-level processes the body undergoes when low on oxygen – from helping our muscles function during exercise to adapting to life at high altitude.
Cells’ oxygen-sensing ability is also essential during foetal
development and in creating new blood vessels.
A la rge number of diseases a re linked to EPO, including rena l failure and severe anaemia.
Cancerous tumours use the body’s ox ygen-reg u lat i ng tools to hijack blood vessel for mation a nd a l low the cancer cells to spread. The Nobel committee said on Monday that severa l tria ls were under way developing drugs to interrupt t his process, potentially short-circuiting tumour grow th.
“Intense ongoing ef for ts i n academic laboratories and pharmaceutical companies are now focused on developing drugs t hat can interfere w it h d i f ferent d i sea se st ates by eit her act ivat i ng, or block i ng, t he ox ygen-sensi ng machi ner y,” t he jur y said.
Kaelin, 61, works at t he Howard Hughes Medical Institute in the US, while Semenza, 63, is director of the Vascular Research Program at the Joh ns Hopk i ns Inst it ute for Cel l Engineering.
Ratclif fe, 65, is director of clinica l research at t he Francis Crick Institute in London and director of the Ta r g e t Di s c ov e r y I n s t i t ut e i n Oxford.
Monday’s announcement opened a n unusua l 2019 Nobel season in which t wo literature laureates will be crow ned a f ter a sca nda l postponed last year’s award.
The Peace Prize will be awarded in Oslo on Friday, wit h speculation r i fe t hat Swedish teenage act iv ist Greta Thunberg could win for her campaign to raise awareness about climate change.
Ot her names circu lat ing for t he honour are Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy A hmed, who cl i nched a peace deal with arch foe Eritrea, and NGOs such as Repor ters wit hout Borders and the Committee to Protect Journa lists.
Before t hat, t he Physics Prize will be announced on Tuesday and the Chemistr y Prize on Wednesday.
On Thursday, the Swedish Academy will announce one literature laureate for 2018 and one for 2019, after postponing last year’s award due to a sexual harassment scandal that exposed deep rifts among its 18 members.
The Academy has spent the past year tr y ing to address its issues and restore its honour, and is t herefore seen to be steering clear of controversy in its picks.
Among the writers who have been making a buzz include Poland’s Olga Tokarczuk, Kenya’s NgugiWa Thiong’o, Ismail Kadare of Albania, Joyce Carol Oates of the US and Japan’s Haruki Murakami, say critics.
The a nnouncement of t he Economics Prize will wrap things up on Monday, October 14.