San Francisco scientist shares Nobel Prize in medicine with 2 others for work on the human immune system

Mary E. Brunkow, Fred Ramsdell and Dr. Shimon Sakaguchi received the Nobel Prize in medicine for discoveries concerning peripheral immune tolerance. Brunkow is a senior program manager at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle; Ramsdell is a scientific adviser for Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco; Sakaguchi is a distinguished professor at the Immunology Frontier Research Center at Osaka University in Japan. Sakaguchi discovered regulatory T cells in 1995. In 2001 Brunkow and Ramsdell identified a Foxp3 gene mutation linked to a rare human autoimmune disease. In 2003 Sakaguchi connected Foxp3 to the development of T-regs, which curb overreactive T cells. Researchers now pursue T-reg-based therapies for autoimmune disease and cancer.

"STOCKHOLM - Mary E. Brunkow, Fred Ramsdell and Dr. Shimon Sakaguchi won the Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for their discoveries concerning peripheral immune tolerance. Brunkow, 64, is a senior program manager at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle. Ramsdell, 64, is a scientific adviser for Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco. Sakaguchi, 74, is a distinguished professor at the Immunology Frontier Research Center at Osaka University in Japan."

"The Nobel Committee said it started with Sakaguchi's discovery in 1995 of a previously unknown T cell subtype now known as regulatory T cells or T-regs. Then in 2001, Brunkow and Ramsdell discovered a culprit mutation in a gene named Foxp3, a gene that also plays a role in a rare human autoimmune disease. The Nobel Committee said two years later, Sakaguchi linked the discoveries to show that the Foxp3 gene controls the development of those T-regs."

"The immune system has many overlapping systems to detect and fight bacteria, viruses and other bad actors. Key immune warriors such as T cells get trained on how to spot bad actors. If some instead go awry in a way that might trigger autoimmune diseases, they're supposed to be eliminated in the thymus - a process called central tolerance. The Nobel winners unraveled an additional way the body keeps the system in check."

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