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The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded for revolutionary findings that illuminate how the immune system attacks harmful infections while protecting the healthy tissues.

A trio of esteemed researchers—Japan's Shimon Sakaguchi and US experts Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell—received this accolade.

Their research uncovered unique "security guards" within the immune system that remove rogue defense cells that could harming the body.

The findings are now paving the way for innovative therapies for immune disorders and cancer.

These winners will divide a prize fund worth 11m SEK.

Decisive Discoveries

"Their research has been decisive for comprehending how the immune system operates and the reason we don't all develop severe self-attack conditions," commented the chair of the award panel.

This team's studies explain a core mystery: How does the immune system protect us from countless infections while keeping our healthy cells intact?

The body's protection system employs immune cells that search for signs of infection, even viruses and bacteria it has never encountered.

These defenders utilize sensors—known as recognition units—that are produced randomly in a vast number of variations.

That gives the defense network the ability to fight a wide array of invaders, but the randomness of the process unavoidably creates immune cells that may attack the host.

Security Guards of the Body

Researchers earlier knew that a portion of these harmful defense cells were destroyed in the immune organ—where white blood cells develop.

This year's award honors the discovery of T-reg cells—known as the immune system's "peacekeepers"—which patrol the system to disarm other immune cells that assault the healthy cells.

It is known that this mechanism malfunctions in self-attack conditions such as juvenile diabetes, MS, and RA.

A prize committee stated, "These discoveries have established a novel area of research and spurred the development of new treatments, for example for tumors and autoimmune diseases."

In cancer, T-regs prevent the body from attacking the growth, so research are aimed at reducing their quantity.

In self-attack disorders, trials are exploring increasing regulatory T-cells so the body is no longer under attack. A similar method could also be effective in reducing the risks of organ transplant rejection.

Innovative Experiments

Professor Shimon Sakaguchi, from a Japanese institution, conducted experiments on rodents that had their immune gland removed, causing autoimmune disease.

He demonstrated that injecting immune cells from other animals could prevent the illness—suggesting there was a mechanism for blocking immune cells from attacking the body.

Mary Brunkow, affiliated with the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, and Fred Ramsdell, now at Sonoma Biotherapeutics in San Francisco, were investigating an inherited autoimmune disease in mice and people that resulted in the identification of a genetic factor vital for the way regulatory T-cells function.

"Their groundbreaking work has uncovered how the immune system is kept in check by T-reg cells, preventing it from accidentally targeting the body's own tissues," commented a leading physiology expert.

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