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This year's prestigious award in medical science has been granted for transformative discoveries that illuminate how the immune system attacks harmful pathogens while sparing the body's own cells.

Three esteemed researchers—Japan's Prof. Sakaguchi and American experts Mary Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—share this honor.

Their work identified specialized "sentinels" within the immune system that eliminate malfunctioning defense cells that could attacking the organism.

These discoveries are now enabling innovative treatments for autoimmune diseases and cancer.

These winners will divide a monetary award worth 11m SEK.

Decisive Findings

"Their research has been essential for comprehending how the immune system operates and the reason we don't all suffer from severe autoimmune diseases," commented the chair of the award panel.

This team's research explain a fundamental question: In what way does the defense system defend us from numerous invaders while keeping our healthy cells unharmed?

Our body's protection system uses white blood cells that scan for signs of disease, even pathogens and germs it has not met before.

These defenders employ detectors—known as receptors—that are produced by chance in countless variations.

This gives the immune system the capacity to combat a broad range of invaders, but the unpredictability of the process unavoidably produces white blood cells that may attack the body.

Protectors of the Body

Scientists earlier understood that some of these problematic white blood cells were eliminated in the immune organ—the site where white blood cells develop.

This year's Nobel Prize recognizes the discovery of regulatory T-cells—described as the body's "security guards"—which travel through the body to disarm any defenders that attack the healthy cells.

It is known that this process fails in self-attack conditions such as juvenile diabetes, multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis.

A prize committee stated, "These discoveries have established a new field of investigation and accelerated the development of innovative therapies, for example for tumors and autoimmune diseases."

In cancer, regulatory T-cells block the system from attacking the growth, so research are focused on lowering their quantity.

In self-attack disorders, trials are testing boosting regulatory T-cells so the body is no longer being harmed. A similar method could also be effective in minimizing the chances of organ transplant rejection.

Innovative Studies

Professor Sakaguchi, from a Japanese institution, conducted experiments on rodents that had their immune gland extracted, causing self-attack conditions.

He demonstrated that introducing immune cells from healthy mice could stop the illness—suggesting there was a system for blocking defenders from attacking the host.

Dr. Brunkow, from the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Dr. Ramsdell, currently at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco, were investigating an inherited autoimmune disease in mice and people that led to the identification of a genetic factor vital for how regulatory T-cells function.

"Their groundbreaking research has revealed how the body's defenses is controlled by regulatory T cells, preventing it from mistakenly targeting the body's own tissues," commented a leading physiology expert.

"This work is a striking illustration of how basic biological research can have broad implications for human health."