The famous award will be split between three researchers

Oct 3, 2011 12:44 GMT  ·  By
Three researchers will share the 2011 Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine
   Three researchers will share the 2011 Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine

A press release from the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet announced earlier today that the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine goes to researchers Bruce A. Beutler, Jules A. Hoffmann and Ralph M. Steinman.

The 2011 Laureates “have revolutionized our understanding of the immune system by discovering key principles for its activation,” the Assembly announced. The award will be split in half, between Bruce Beutler and Jules Hoffmann on one hand, and Ralph Steinman on the other.

The former two will each receive 25 percent of the award, while Steinman will get 50 percent. All the researchers that will be awarded this year contributed extensively to forwarding science and knowledge in their respective fields of research.

Working as a team, Beutle and Hoffmann were able to discover a series of receptor proteins on cells that are capable of recognizing microorganisms that invade the body. These receptors are responsible for activating the first stage of our immune response, the innate immunity.

In his own studies, Steinman was able to discovery that the dendritic cells inside the human immune system are capable of activating when the situation demands it. They can also regulate a later stage of our immune response, called adaptive immunity.

Based on these investigations, scientists were able to conduct studies into the nature and capabilities of the immune system through a new perspective, opening the door for a wide variety of new cures aimed at a wide variety of diseases.

Some of these conditions include inflammatory disorders, cancers and various forms of infection. At this point, it is impossible to quantify the extent to which these three researchers helped others, but the Assembly decided that the contributions they made are far-reaching enough even now.

Finding out more about how the body's natural defenses function could lead to the development of methods for attacking persistent viruses such as HIV, among many others. It could also be possible to develop cures against antibiotic-resistant bacteria that infect people in hospitals.

The Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteria is the clearest example of such an organism. It is responsible for the bulk of hospital-acquired infections recorded in the developed world.

The new knowledge the three brought forth may also be used to activate the immune system in fighting cancers, or inhibit it from attacking the body's own organs in autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis.