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| J. Hoffmann, B. Beutler, R. Steinman |
Finally I got the Nobel Prize!! Actually,
innate immunity, my research topic, got the prize. The innate immune system is the main weapon that keeps organisms without infections. A proof-of-concept example is the pioneering work carried out by
Jules Hoffmann´s team showing how fruit flies combact infections. Their work led to the identification of the receptor, named Toll, used by the flies to detect pathogens. A similar receptor, called Toll-like receptor (TLR) 4, turned out to be expressed by our cells and its activation cause inflammation, an essential response to eliminate invading microorganisms.
Bruce Beutler´s studies using knock-out mice made an elegant clear-cut case. However, we should not forget that the work and insights of
Charles Janeway were the driving force for this line of research. World-class scientists continuing his fundamental work are
Ruslan Medzhitov,
Shizou Akira,
Douglas Golenbock,
Terje Espevik,
Luke O´Neill,...just to mention a few. However something is missing...A dogma in Biology is the receptor-ligand notion. In other words, there is always a ligand, at least one, for a given receptor. Let´s put in Nobel Prize context decades of outstanding research on the TLR4 ligand: the
lipopolysaccharide.
Finally I got the Nobel Prize!! Actually, innate immunity, my research topic, got the prize. The innate immune system is the main weapon that keeps organisms without infections. A proof-of-concept example is the pioneering work carried out by Jules Hoffmann´s team showing how fruit flies combact infections. Their work led to the identification of the receptor, named Toll, used by the flies to detect pathogens. A similar receptor, called Toll-like receptor (TLR) 4, turned out to be expressed by our cells and its activation cause inflammation, an essential response to eliminate invading microorganisms. Bruce Beutler´s studies using knock-out mice made an elegant clear-cut case. However, we should not forget that the work and insights of Charles Janeway were the driving force for this line of research. World-class scientists continuing his fundamental work are Ruslan Medzhitov, Shizou Akira, Douglas Golenbock, Terje Espevik, Luke O´Neill,...just to mention a few. However something is missing...A dogma in Biology is the receptor-ligand notion. In other words, there is always a ligand, at least one, for a given receptor. Let´s put in Nobel Prize context decades of outstanding research on the TLR4 ligand: the lipopolysaccharide.