Sao Paulo
The 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine went to Hungarian biochemist Katalin Karikó and American doctor Drew Weissman for their research that contributed to the development of messenger RNA vaccines that are fundamental to fighting Covid19.
“Through their groundbreaking discoveries that have fundamentally changed our understanding of how mRNA interacts with our immune system, the laureates have contributed to the development of vaccines during one of the greatest threats to human health in modern times,” said the panel, which formed the Winner determined.
Katalin Karikó was born in 1955 in Szolnok, Hungary. She received her doctorate from the University of Szeged in 1982 and in the following years conducted postdoctoral research at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and Temple University. In 1989 she was appointed assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, where she remained until 2013. She then became vice president of BioNTech RNA Pharmaceuticals. Since 2021 she has been a professor at the University of Szeged and the University of Pennsylvania.
Drew Weissman was born in 1959 in Massachusetts, USA. He received his doctorate from Boston University in 1987 and conducted postdoctoral research at the NIH (National Institutes of Health). In 1997, Weissman founded his research group at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He is currently director of the Penn Institute for RNA Innovations.
In addition to an 18karat gold medal and a diploma, the winners will receive 11 million Swedish crowns, about R$5 million.
The awards ceremony will continue in the next few days. The Nobel Prize winner for Physics will be announced this Tuesday (3) and for Chemistry on Wednesday (4). The winners in the literature (5) and peace (6) categories will then be announced. The following week it is the turn of the Economics Prize (9).
The award ceremony will take place on December 10th, the anniversary of Alfred Nobel’s death.
Latest winners
Last year, the prize was awarded to Swedish researcher Svante Pääbo for decoding the genomes of extinct hominins, missing members of the primate group that includes humans. Among other things, in 2010 he coordinated the work to sequence the entire DNA of the Neanderthals, who disappeared around 40,000 years ago.
In 2021, the prize went to the American David Julius and the Lebanese of Armenian origin Ardem Patapoutian, 54. The two clarified the mechanisms that enable the nervous system to absorb temperature stimuli and touch the skin.
In 2020, three researchers shared the Nobel Prize in Medicine for the discovery of the hepatitis C virus: Americans Harvey Alter and Charles Rice from the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Rockefeller University, and Briton Michael Houghton went emerged as a winner. Prize winner.
In 2019, William G. Kaelin of Harvard University, Peter J. Ratcliffe of the University of Oxford, and Gregg L. Semenza of Johns Hopkins University were honored for their research into how cells sense and change behavior. with the availability of oxygen.
In 2018, James P. Allison and Tasuku Honjo were recognized for discoveries related to immunotherapy, the fight against cancer with drugs that improve the function of the immune system.
Past awardwinning discoveries include those on the structure of DNA by James Watson, Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins (1962), those on penicillin by Fleming and others (1945), those on the citric acid cycle by Hans Krebs (1953) and the structure of the nervous system by Camillo Golgi and Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1906).
“I wish that when awarding prizes no consideration should be given to nationality, but rather that the prize be awarded to the most worthy person, regardless of whether he or she is Scandinavian or not,” says Alfred Nobel’s will.
Despite this desire, the concentration of scientific awards in rich countries is significant. Not to mention the small number of excellent women. Of the 227 laureates in medicine or physiology since 1901, only 13 are women.
How the Nobel Prize winner is selected
The award began with the death of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. In 1895, Nobel wrote in his last will and testament that his fortune should be used to build a prize which was met with opposition from his family. The first prize was awarded in 1901.
Selection of the winner in the field of physiology or medicine begins with nominations from a group of 50 researchers affiliated with the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden. In his will, Alfred Nobel commissioned the institution to select researchers who have made notable contributions to the future of humanity.
The process begins in the year before the award, specifically in September, with the sending of invitations to nominate a name for the award, which must be done by January 31st.
Members of the Karolinska Institute Nobel Committee may suggest names; Professionals in the field of biology and medicine affiliated with the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences; winner of prizes in physiology, medicine or chemistry; Professors of medicine from Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, Icelandic or Danish institutions; Professors in similar positions at other medical schools at universities around the world, selected by the Nobel Committee with the aim of ensuring an appropriate distribution of the task across several countries; and scholars and scientists selected by the Nobel Committee. Selfnominations will not be accepted.