AsianScientist (Oct. 20, 2016) – The 21st Keio Medical Science Prize has recently been awarded to Professor Tasuku Honjo from the Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto University.
The other laureate to receive the Prize is Professor Svante Pääbo, director of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany.
Keio University annually awards the Keio Medical Science Prize to recognize researchers who have made an outstanding contribution to the fields of medicine or the life sciences. It is the only prize of its kind awarded by a Japanese university, and six laureates of this Prize have later won the Nobel Prize. Laureates receive a certificate of merit, medal, and a monetary award of 10 million yen (~US$96,400).
Honjo first discovered PD-1 as an inducible gene in activated T-lymphocytes. Then, he demonstrated that PD-1-deficient mice develop autoimmune diseases and that PD-1 inhibits T-cell activation by binding to ligands of PD-1, thereby revealing that PD-1 is a negative regulator of immune responses.
Based on his discovery, clinical trials of the human anti-PD-1 antibody nivolumab have been performed, and it has been actually proven that PD-1 blockade is effective for a number of human tumors, including melanoma and lung cancer.
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Source: Keio University.
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