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The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded for revolutionary discoveries that illuminate how the immune system targets harmful infections while protecting the body's own cells.

Three esteemed researchers—Japan's Shimon Sakaguchi and US experts Mary Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—received this honor.

The work identified specialized "sentinels" within the defense system that remove rogue defense cells capable of attacking the organism.

The findings are now enabling new therapies for autoimmune diseases and cancer.

These laureates will divide a prize fund valued at 11 million SEK.

Decisive Findings

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

The team's studies address a fundamental mystery: In what way does the defense system defend us from countless invaders while leaving our own tissues intact?

The immune system employs immune cells that scan for signs of disease, even viruses and germs it has not met before.

Such cells utilize detectors—known as receptors—that are produced by chance in a vast number of variations.

That gives the immune system the capacity to combat a wide array of invaders, but the randomness of the mechanism unavoidably produces white blood cells that may target the host.

Protectors of the Body

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

This year's Nobel Prize honors the identification of T-reg cells—known as the immune system's "peacekeepers"—which patrol the system to neutralize other immune cells that assault the healthy cells.

We know that this mechanism fails in self-attack conditions such as juvenile diabetes, MS, and rheumatoid arthritis.

A prize committee stated, "The discoveries have laid the foundation for a new field of research and accelerated the development of new treatments, for instance for tumors and autoimmune diseases."

In malignancies, regulatory T-cells prevent the body from fighting the growth, so research are focused on reducing their quantity.

In self-attack disorders, trials are testing increasing T-reg cells so the body is not under attack. A similar approach could also be effective in reducing the chances of organ transplant failure.

Innovative Studies

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

He showed that injecting defense cells from healthy mice could stop the illness—implying there was a mechanism for preventing defenders from harming the body.

Dr. Brunkow, from the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Dr. Ramsdell, now at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco, were investigating an inherited immune disorder in rodents and humans that resulted in the discovery of a genetic factor critical for the way regulatory T-cells operate.

"Their pioneering work has revealed how the body's defenses is kept in check by regulatory T cells, preventing it from mistakenly attacking the healthy cells," commented a prominent physiology specialist.

"This research is a striking illustration of how fundamental physiological study can have broad consequences for human health."