Japan's Osumi Wins Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine

Tokyo, Oct. 3 (Jiji Press)--Sweden's Karolinska Institute said Monday it will give the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine to Yoshinori Osumi, honorary professor at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, for his discoveries of mechanisms for autophagy, a process for degrading and recycling unnecessary proteins within cells. Osumi, 71, is the fourth Japanese winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, after Satoshi Omura, professor emeritus at Kitasato University, who won it in 2015, Kyoto University Prof. Shinya Yamanaka, who received it in 2012, and Susumu Tonegawa, director of Riken's Brain Science Institute, who won it in 1987. It is the third straight year for a Nobel Prize to be won by a Japanese. Osumi is the 25th Japanese to win a Nobel Prize. "I'm very honored. I feel a special weight for the Nobel Prize," Osumi told a press conference at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe called Osumi and congratulated him for winning the prize. Abe told Osumi that he is proud of the achievement as a fellow Japanese. Protein composition and degradation are key life-sustaining activities for creatures, but little had been known until the late 1980s about the process for degrading and recycling unnecessary proteins. Autophagy is linked to diseases including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and cancer, and Osumi's discovery is expected to be used in treatments for such diseases. Osumi's discoveries "led to a new paradigm in our understanding of how the cell recycles its content," the Karolinska Institute said. If the process for degrading and recycling proteins is compared with garbage disposal, there are two possible methods. One is to put seals on garbage bags individually and carry out disposal via waste disposal equipment, while the other is to put all kinds of garbage into garbage bags without seals and send them to disposal sites. The latter method may be considered to parallel the autophagy process. The late Belgian scientist Christian de Duve, professor emeritus at Rockefeller University in the United States, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1974 for the discovery of the autophagy process using liver cells from rats. But the detailed process of autophagy remained unknown. Soon after becoming associate professor at the University of Tokyo in 1988, Osumi confirmed the autophagy process in yeast cells with the naked eye using a light microscope for the first time ever. During the process, membrane that coats and isolates unnecessary proteins and other substances was generated in cytoplasm. The membrane then became like a garbage bag and was absorbed into vacuole, the final disposal place. He also discovered autophagy genes. After Osumi became professor at the National Institute for Basic Biology in Okazaki, Aichi Prefecture, central Japan, University of Tokyo Prof. Noboru Mizushima began to identify genes related to autophagy using mice. Mizushima discovered that the process is a common framework for a variety of animals and plants, including human beings. He also discovered that autophagy can trigger diseases. The award ceremony is scheduled to be held in Stockholm on Dec. 10. Osumi is expected to receive a cash prize of 8 million Swedish krona. END