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This year's Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been granted for transformative discoveries that illuminate how the body's defense network attacks dangerous pathogens while sparing the body's own cells.

Three renowned researchers—Japan's Prof. Sakaguchi and US scientists Mary Brunkow and Dr. Ramsdell—received this accolade.

The work identified unique "security guards" within the immune system that remove rogue defense cells capable of harming the organism.

These findings are now enabling innovative therapies for autoimmune diseases and cancer.

These laureates will share a monetary award worth 11m Swedish kronor.

Decisive Findings

"The research has been decisive for understanding how the body's defenses operates and why we do not all develop severe self-attack conditions," commented the chair of the award panel.

This team's studies address a fundamental mystery: How does the immune system defend us from numerous infections while leaving our healthy cells unharmed?

Our body's protection system uses immune cells that scan for indicators of disease, even viruses and bacteria it has never encountered.

Such cells employ detectors—called recognition units—that are produced randomly in a vast number of combinations.

That provides the defense network the capacity to combat a broad range of threats, but the randomness of the process inevitably produces immune cells that may attack the body.

Security Guards of the Immune System

Researchers earlier knew that some of these harmful white blood cells were eliminated in the thymus—the site where white blood cells develop.

The latest award recognizes the discovery of regulatory T-cells—described as the body's "security guards"—which patrol the system to neutralize other defenders that attack the body's own tissues.

We know that this process fails in self-attack conditions such as type-1 diabetes, MS, and rheumatoid arthritis.

The Nobel panel stated, "The findings have established a new field of investigation and accelerated the creation of new therapies, for instance for tumors and autoimmune diseases."

In cancer, regulatory T-cells block the system from fighting the growth, so studies are aimed at reducing their quantity.

For self-attack disorders, experiments are exploring boosting T-reg cells so the organism is no longer under attack. A similar approach could also be useful in minimizing the chances of transplanted organ rejection.

Innovative Studies

Prof Sakaguchi, of a Japanese institution, conducted experiments on mice that had their thymus removed, leading to autoimmune disease.

The researcher showed that injecting defense cells from healthy animals could stop the disease—implying there was a system for blocking defenders from harming the body.

Dr. Brunkow, from the a research center in Seattle, and Dr. Ramsdell, currently at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in a California city, were studying an genetic autoimmune disease in rodents and humans that resulted in the identification of a gene critical for how T-regs operate.

"The pioneering work has uncovered how the body's defenses is controlled by T-reg cells, preventing it from accidentally attacking the healthy cells," said a leading biological science expert.

"This work is a remarkable example of how basic physiological study can have broad implications for public health."