It was awarded to three scientists—Mary E. Brunkow (USA), Fred Ramsdell (USA), and Shimon Sakaguchi (Japan)—for their crucial discoveries about peripheral immune tolerance.
What did they discover?
Problem: Our immune system is incredibly powerful, designed to attack and destroy foreign invaders. But it needs a “security system” to stop it from attacking our own healthy cells and organs, which results in autoimmune diseases like Type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis.
Breakthrough: The laureates identified and defined the role of the immune system’s ‘security guards’: a special type of white blood cell called regulatory T cells (Tregs).
Shimon Sakaguchi first discovered this unique class of T cells in the mid-1990s.
Mary E. Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell later linked these cells to a specific gene, Foxp3, showing that mutations in this gene caused a severe autoimmune disease in humans and mice.
Function: Regulatory T cells act as a powerful brake, or “peacekeepers,” ensuring the immune system tolerates the body’s own tissues—a process called peripheral immune tolerance.
Importance
This work has been groundbreaking for immunology. By understanding how the body controls its own immune response, researchers have opened new avenues for treating disease:
Autoimmune diseases: Developing ways to boost the activity of regulatory T cells to stop the immune system from attacking healthy organs.
Cancer therapy: Finding methods to temporarily suppress regulatory T cells near tumors so the immune system can launch a stronger, more effective attack on cancer cells.
Transplant medicine: Better regulation of the immune system to prevent the rejection of transplanted organs.
