Japanese scientist wins 2016 Nobel medicine prize
October 03 2016 01:10 PM
Nobel Medicine prize
A graph explaining parts of the work on autophagy by Yoshinori Ohsumi (inset) of Japan is displayed on the screen at the Nobel Forum in Stockholm, after the announcement that Ohsumi won the Nobel Prize in Medicine on Monday.


Japan's Yoshinori Ohsumi won the 2016 Nobel prize for medicine or physiology for his discovery of how cells break down and recycle their content, which could lead to a better understanding of diseases like cancer, Parkinson's and type 2 diabetes.
"Ohsumi's discoveries led to a new paradigm in our understanding of how the cell recycles its content," the Nobel Assembly at Sweden's Karolinska Institute said in a statement on awarding the prize of 8 million Swedish crowns ($933,000).
"His discoveries opened the path to understanding ... many physiological processes, such as in the adaptation to starvation or response to infection," the statement added.
Ohsumi's work on cell breakdown, a field known as autophagy, is important because it can help explain what goes wrong in a range of diseases.
"Mutations in autophagy ('self eating') genes can cause disease, and the autophagic process is involved in several conditions including cancer and neurological disease," the statement said.
"I am extremely honoured," he told Kyodo News agency.
This year, the Karolinska Institute, the institution that awards the medicine prize, has been immersed in a scandal over the hiring of a controversial surgeon. The Swedish government dismissed several members of the board in September.

Last updated: October 03 2016 01:44 PM

There are no comments.
