Work on autophagy gives Yoshinori Ohsumi Nobel Prize in medicine

The Nobel prize in medicine has been awarded to a Japanese cell biologist for discoveries on how cells break down and recycle their own components.

This year's Nobel Laureate discovered and elucidated mechanisms underlying autophagy, a fundamental process for degrading and recycling cellular components.  

Ohsumi was born on February 9, 1945 in Fukuoka, Japan. He received a B.Sci. in 1967 and a D.Sci. in 1974, both from the University of Tokyo. In 1974–77 he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Rockefeller University in New York City.[1]

He returned to The University of Tokyo in 1977 as a research associate; he was appointed Lecturer there in 1986, and promoted to Associate Professor in 1988. In 1996 he moved to the National Institute for Basic Biology in Okazaki City, Japan. where he was appointed as a professor. From 2004 to 2009 he was also professor at the Graduate University for Advanced Studies in Hayama, Japan. In 2009 he transitioned to a three-way appointment as an emeritus professor at the National Institute for Basic Biology and at the Graduate University for Advanced Studies, and a professorship at the Advanced Research Organization, Integrated Research Institute, Tokyo Institute of Technology. After his retirement in 2014, he continued to serve as Professor at Institute of Innovative Research, Tokyo Institute of Technology. Currently, he is head of the Cell Biology Research Unit, Institute of Innovative Research, Tokyo Institute of Technology.

The word autophagy originates from the Greek words auto-, meaning "self", and phagein, meaning "to eat". Thus,autophagy denotes "self eating". This concept emerged during the 1960's, when researchers first observed that the cell could destroy its own contents by enclosing it in membranes, forming sack-like vesicles that were transported to a recycling compartment, called the lysosome, for degradation. Difficulties in studying the phenomenon meant that little was known until, in a series of brilliant experiments in the early 1990's, Yoshinori Ohsumi used baker's yeast to identify genes essential for autophagy. He then went on to elucidate the underlying mechanisms for autophagy in yeast and showed that similar sophisticated machinery is used in our cells.

Ohsumi's discoveries led to a new paradigm in our understanding of how the cell recycles its content. His discoveries opened the path to understanding the fundamental importance of autophagy in many physiological processes, such as in the adaptation to starvation or response to infection. Mutations in autophagy genes can cause disease, and the autophagic process is involved in several conditions including cancer and neurological disease.

Speaking to reporters in Tokyo on Monday, Ohsumi said: “As a boy, the Nobel Prize was a dream, but after starting my research, it was out of my picture.”

He said he chose to focus on the cell’s waste disposal system, an unfashionable subject at the time, because he wanted to work on something different.

“I don’t feel comfortable competing with many people, and instead I find it more enjoyable doing something nobody else is doing,” he added. “In a way, that’s what science is all about, and the joy of finding something inspires me.”

Ohsumi, who was in his lab when he received the phone call from Thomas Perlmann, secretary of the Nobel Committee, admitted to being in a “slight state of shock” about the news.

Giovanna Mallucci, a professor of clinical neuroscience at the University of Cambridge, said that Ohsumi’s discoveries were paving the way for new approaches to treating diseases, from cancer to neurodegenerative illnesses.

“I think it’s very important that this area of science been recognised,” she said. “The important principle here is going for common mechanisms in disease. It opens up avenues to treating these disorders that are different from more conventional disease-specific approaches.”

Disclaimer: This is a nonprofit blog. My objective, as a young girl born in 1999, is just to share my passion for Medicine by giving the world some information about the latest tendencies in this field. Please click on the links below to obtain a more detailed information about the articles I have used as a source.

https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2016/press.html?ctkey=autophagy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshinori_Ohsumi
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/oct/03/yoshinori-ohsumi-wins-nobel-prize-in-medicine