Nobel Laureates associated with the March of Dimes
Linus Pauling, Ph.D. Nobel Prize in Chemistry, 1954
Linus Pauling received one of the earliest basic research grants given by the March of Dimes. His Nobel Prize-winning research into the nature of molecular bonds led to important insights into how a molecule’s structure influences its chemical function.
This early, basic research had important implications for research on human disease. It introduced the idea that changes in the structure of a molecule could make the molecule function improperly, resulting in illness. Dr. Pauling proposed the concept of molecular diseases by using sickle cell anemia, and inherited disorder, as a model. Application of Dr. Pauling’s theory to the study of sickle cell anemia led to the discovery that this disease is caused by abnormalities in the structure of hemoglobin, the red blood cell molecule that transports oxygen throughout the body.
Dr. Pauling’s theory became the basis for further study into sickle cell anemia and other inherited red blood cell diseases, as well as for broader genetics study. Inherited diseases of hemoglobin (such as sickle cell anemia and thalassemia) are among the best-understood genetic diseases and serve as models for understanding and researching other disorders of genetic origin.
John F. Enders, Ph.D. Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1954
Thomas H. Weller, M.D. and Frederick Robbins, M.D.
John Enders, Thomas H. Weller, and Frederick Robbins, then March of Dimes grantees, discovered in 1947 that poliovirus could be grown in non-nervous tissue. Previously, viruses had been known to grow only in the nervous system of monkeys. This was a barrier to producing a polio vaccine because a vaccine that contains foreign nervous tissue (like that of monkeys) is dangerous – and could be lethal – to humans.
The three researchers’ Nobel Prize-winning research broke down two major barriers to polio immunization: It made laboratory cultivation of the virus possible and permitted the preparation of a vaccine without unsafe foreign nervous tissue. The work of Drs. Enders, Weller, and Robbins made possible the production of a polio vaccine by Dr. Jonas Salk just a few years later and paved the way for the development of vaccines for other viral infections.
James D. Watson, Ph.D. Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1962
In 1953, James D. Watson and Francis H. C. Crick published the results of their work to determine the structure of DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid. They described DNA as a double-stranded helix and correctly suggested how DNA duplicates itself to create identical copies of genetic information in every cell of a living organism, and how this genetic information is transmitted from generation to generation.
These researches revolutionized the study of living matter, opened new ways to analyze and classify diseases, and made it possible to devise strategies to prevent and treat them. Twenty-five years ago biologists were just beginning to understand the structure of DNA. Today, the genes responsible for a number of diseases have been isolated. The biotechnology industry uses DNA formulated in the laboratory to manufacture insulin and other life-saving proteins.
(Note: Dr. Watson’s Nobel Prize was shared with Francis H. C. Crick and Maurice H. F. Wilkins)
Max Delbruck, Ph.D. Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1969
Using bacteriophages – viruses that attack bacterial cells – Max Delbruck and his associates showed how genes direct normal development and how mutations cause abnormal development. More than any other discipline, bacteriophage research helped usher in the age of molecular biology. Molecular biologists study the structure and function of individual molecules in cells to explain the properties of living organisms.
Molecular biology already is having a substantial and rapidly accelerating impact on medicine. Its ideas and methods permeate all health sciences, nowhere more clearly than in areas concerned with birth defects. Researchers are investigating molecular bases of inherited diseases and all gene action.
(Note: Dr. Delbruck shared the Nobel Prize with Alfred D. Hershey and Salvadore E. Luria)
D. Carleton Gajdusek, M.D. Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1976
D. Carleton Gajdusek investigated kuru, a unique degenerative brain disorder that occurs in a native tribe in New Guinea. Dr. Gajdusek showed that kuru, which was thought to be hereditary, was actually caused by a slow-virus infection. A slow-virus infection is one that remains dormant for a long period (up to 20 years in the case of kuru) before damaging the human host.
Kuru was the first slow-virus disease affecting humans to be identified and Dr. Gajdusek’s work stimulated efforts in the search for other slow-virus infections in humans. Similarities between changes in the brain of victims of kuru and those with Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) – another rare, fatal brain disorder – led scientists to classify CJD as a slow-virus disease. Following from Dr. Gajdusek’s research, some scientists believe that a slow virus may be involved in some forms of Alzheimer’s disease.
(Note: Dr. Gajdusek shared the Nobel Prize with Baruch Blumberg.)
Joseph L. Goldstein, M.D. Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 1985
Joseph L. Goldstein, who received one of the first March of Dimes Starter Research Grants, conducted research to determine the causes of familial hypercholestorolemia (FH), an inherited tendency to very high cholesterol levels in the blood. FH is one of the most common genetic disorders, affecting about 400,000 Americans.
In the work that led to his Nobel Prize, Dr. Goldstein found that in typical FH patients who have one normal and one defective gene, the cells that normally gauge the amount of cholesterol being produced do not work properly. These defective cells incorrectly perceive the amount of cholesterol in the blood, which can accumulate in arteries and lead to heart attacks in middle age. FH patients with two defective genes have virtually no ability to detect cholesterol in the blood and may begin to have heart attacks in childhood.
Dr. Goldstein later received a March of Dimes grant to study the interrelationships between specific genetic disorders of cholesterol metabolism, the levels of cholesterol in the blood, and the effects of drugs designed to lower cholesterol. His discoveries have led to the use of these drugs to decrease life-threatening levels of cholesterol and to the development of strategies – including surgery, medication, and diet – to treat victims of FH.
(Note: Dr. Goldstein shared the Nobel Prize with Michael S. Brown.)
1995
Edward B. Lewis, PhD and Eric F. Wieschaus, PhD,
identified master genes that control early structural development of the body.
(shared with Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, PhD)
2002
Sydney Brenner, DPhil, FRS, and H. Robert Horvitz, PhD, received the Prize in Physiology or Medicine for their discoveries on genetic regulation of organ development and programmed cell death.
(shared with John
E. Sulston, PhD)
2003
Peter C. Agre, MD, identified the long-sought channels through which our cells precisely control influx and outflux of water via their membranes, a process fundamental to all life.
(shared with Roderick MacKinnon, MD)
2006
Craig C. Mello, PhD, discovered RNA interference (RNAi), a natural mechanism whereby cells suppress the actions of specific genes, and one that scientists use to suppress selected genes in many fields of biological research, including exploration of RNAi treatments for a wide range of diseases.
(shared with Andrew Z. Fire, PhD)
Roger D. Kornberg, PhD,
revealed many details of the molecular machinery that transcribes DNA’s genetic
information into messenger RNA, which then carries the information from a
cell’s nucleus to its protein-constructing units.
2007
Mario R. Capecchi, Ph.D., Sir
Martin J. Evans, Ph.D., DSc., FRS, and Oliver
Smithies, D.Phil., FRS, shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
for their pioneering work on gene targeting.
Shinya Yamanaka, MD, Ph.D., selected as the co-recipient for the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Yamanaka received the 2010 March of Dimes Prize in Developmental Biology for programming adult skin cells into embryonic-like stem cells.
March 2002 / David Rose / March of Dimes Archives
