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The prestigious award in medical science was awarded for revolutionary discoveries that clarify how the body's defense network attacks harmful pathogens while sparing the body's own cells.

A trio of esteemed researchers—Japan's Shimon Sakaguchi and American scientists Dr. Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell—share this honor.

Their work uncovered unique "security guards" within the immune system that eliminate malfunctioning defense cells capable of attacking the organism.

The discoveries are now paving the way for new treatments for immune disorders and malignancies.

The winners will share a prize fund valued at 11 million Swedish kronor.

Decisive Discoveries

"Their research has been decisive for understanding how the immune system operates and the reason we don't all suffer from severe self-attack conditions," commented the head of the award panel.

This team's studies explain a core mystery: In what way does the immune system protect us from countless invaders while keeping our healthy cells unharmed?

The immune system uses white blood cells that search for signs of disease, even pathogens and bacteria it has not met before.

These defenders utilize sensors—called receptors—that are generated randomly in countless combinations.

That provides the defense network the ability to combat a wide array of threats, but the randomness of the process unavoidably creates white blood cells that can attack the host.

Security Guards of the Body

Scientists previously knew that a portion of these problematic defense cells were eliminated in the immune organ—where immune cells develop.

This year's Nobel Prize honors the identification of T-reg cells—described as the body's "peacekeepers"—which travel through the system to disarm other defenders that assault the healthy cells.

It is known that this process fails in autoimmune diseases such as juvenile diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis.

The prize committee added, "These findings have laid the foundation for a new field of research and accelerated the development of innovative treatments, for example for tumors and autoimmune diseases."

Regarding malignancies, T-regs prevent the system from attacking the tumor, so studies are focused on lowering their quantity.

For self-attack disorders, trials are testing increasing T-reg cells so the body is no longer being harmed. A comparable approach could also be effective in minimizing the risks of transplanted organ rejection.

Pioneering Experiments

Professor Shimon Sakaguchi, of a Japanese institution, conducted tests on rodents that had their immune gland removed, causing self-attack conditions.

The researcher showed that injecting defense cells from healthy animals could prevent the disease—suggesting there was a system for blocking defenders from attacking the body.

Mary Brunkow, from the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Dr. Ramsdell, currently at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in a California city, were studying an genetic autoimmune disease in mice and people that resulted in the discovery of a gene critical for how regulatory T-cells operate.

"Their groundbreaking research has uncovered how the immune system is kept in check by T-reg cells, stopping it from mistakenly attacking the healthy cells," said a leading physiology expert.

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