Nobel Prize Laureates in Physiology and Medicine named

The 2013 Nobel Week began with the announcement of the names of the laureates of the prize in the field of physiology and medicine. The winners of the award were James Rothman (James E. Rothman), Randy Shekman (Randy W. Schekman) and Thomas C. Sudhof "for discoveries in the regulation of vesicular transport in cells."

Vesicular transport is a method of delivering proteins that are synthesized in a cell in the Golgi complex to the cell membrane with subsequent secretion. This is exactly what happens, for example, with insulin and many other important proteins of our body.

Shekman discovered genes that encode proteins that regulate vesicular transport by comparing normal and mutant yeast cells with impaired vesicular transport.

Rothman described a protein complex that helps the vesicle to integrate into the target membrane, and then release its contents beyond its limits.

Sudov, who had previously received the Lasker Prize for his work, studied the transmission of signals between brain neurons, as well as the role of calcium in this process. He found out that in addition to the protein complex discovered by Rothman, vesicles also have triggers that react to calcium ions.

James Rothman heads the Department of Cell Biology at Yale University School of Medicine, Randy Sheckman works at the University of California, Berkeley. German scientist Thomas Sudhof has been working in the USA since 1983, now he is a professor of molecular and cellular physiology at Stanford University.

The award ceremony of the laureates presented on Monday will be held traditionally on December 10 in Stockholm on the day of the death of the founder of the Nobel Prizes – the Swedish entrepreneur and inventor Alfred Nobel (1833-1896). The sum of each of the Nobel Prizes this year amounted to 8 million Swedish kronor, or 926 thousand euros.

Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru07.10.2013