Trio Share Medicine Nobel
S T O C K H O L M, Oct. 9, 2000 -- Arvid Carlsson, Paul Greengard and EricKandel won the Nobel Prize in medicine for their discoveriesconcerning how messages are transmitted in the nervous system, workthat has paid off for treating Parkinson’s disease.
The three Nobel laureates will share the $915,000 prize fortheir pioneering discoveries concerning one way brain cells sendmessages to each other, according to the award citation.
These discoveries have been crucial for an understanding of thenormal function of the brain. In addition, it laid the groundworkfor developing the standard treatment for Parkinson’s disease andcontributed to the development a class of antidepressants thatincludes Prozac, the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute said today.
Carlsson, 77, is with the University of Goteborg in Sweden,Greengard, 74, is with Rockefeller University in New York andKandel, 70, is an Austrian-born U.S. citizen with ColumbiaUniversity in New York.
More to Come
The winners of the prizes for physics and chemistry will beannounced Tuesday and for economics — the only one not establishedin Nobel’s will — on Wednesday in Stockholm.
The awards culminate Friday with the coveted peace prize inOslo, Norway.
Carlsson’s studies during the late 1950s led to the discovery ofthe drug L-dopa, used to treat Parkinson’s disease, which is stillthe most important treatment for the disease, the committee said.
Greengard was awarded for his discovery of how dopamine andother chemical messengers shuttle messages between brain cells.Kandel was cited for his research on the biology of memory, showingthe importance of changes in the synapse, a tiny gap between braincells where messages are transmitted.
Suspense Over Literature
This year’s award for medicine was bumped to the top slot afterthe academy failed to reach a decision last week on the literatureprize — usually the first announced.
The Swedish Academy, which traditionally keeps the date of theliterature prize secret until a couple days before it announces thewinner, has not set a time yet, but it is always a Thursday,usually in October.
The suspense for the literature award was heightened last weekwhen the academy failed to reach a decision.
Alfred Nobel, the Swedish industrialist and inventor ofdynamite, left only vague guidelines in his will establishing theprizes. The selection committees deliberate in strict secrecy.
Peace Prize Hints
The only public hints available are for the peace prize. Thefive-member awards committee never reveals the candidates, butsometimes those making the nominations announce their favorites.
This year that includes President Clinton and former PresidentJimmy Carter for wide-ranging peace efforts, as well as former U.S.Sen. George Mitchell for his efforts to resolve conflict inNorthern Ireland.
Other reported nominees are former Finnish President MarttiAhtisaari and former Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin fortheir Balkan peace efforts; South Korean President Kim Dae-jung forpromoting good relations in Asia; and a town, northern Albania’sKukes, for accepting 150,000 refugees during the Kosovo conflict.
The literature and peace laureates are usually the most visible,but the new adjectives “Nobel winner” often also bring scientistsmore attention from outside their laboratories.
The Nobel Directive
As for the first announcement, Nobel’s direction that a prize beawarded to the person who made “the most important discoverywithin the domain of physiology or medicine” is interpreted by acommittee of 50 professors from the world-renowned KarolinskaInstitute in the Swedish capital.
The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska invites nominations fromprevious recipients, professors of medicine and other professionalsworldwide before whittling down its choices in the fall, as do theother selection committees.
Last year’s winner was Dr. Guenter Blobel, 64, a German nativeand U.S. citizen who discovered how proteins find their rightfulplaces in cells — a process that goes awry in diseases like cysticfibrosis and plays a key role in the manufacture of some medicines.
The awards always are presented Dec. 10, the anniversary ofNobel’s death in 1896.