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| Winners of 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Peter Agre | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Peter Agre, M.D. is 54 and a professor of biological chemistry at the John Hopkins University School of Medicine. This year he was one of Two winners of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. A prize amount of 10 million dolars was split between the two winners. He was recognized for his Labratory's discovery of water channels in 1991. Water channels are found in cells and allow the transport of water through the cell membrane. This process is important to all living organisms. The discovery of water channels was important because it has allowed scientists to find drugs that target water channel defects that are associated with many kidney and skeletal muscle diseases. For information about how water channels were found and how they work click here. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/2003/October/031008A.htm | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Roderick MacKinnon | ||||||||||||||||||||
| The other winner of this years Nobel Prize in Chemistry was Roderick Mackinnon, A Scientist at the Rockefeller University. He was awarded the prize for determining the structure of Potassium channel which is one kind of Ion channel in the cell membrane that control the passage of salts in and out of cells. Understanding how salts move in and out of cells has helped scientists decribe how electrical signals in our nerve cells are generated. We can now also see ions flowing through channels that can be opened and closed by cellular signals. We can also find drugs for diseases of the nervous system, muscles and the heart which are caused by disturbances in ion channel function. For more information on Ion channels click here. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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| http://www.rockeffeller.edu/reaserch/abstract.php?id=32 | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Bibliography 1)http://www.brightsurf.com/news/oct_03/RSAS_news_100903_b.php 2)http://www.chemie.de/news/e/29387/ 3)http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/press/2003/October/031008A.htm 4)http://www.kva.se/KVA_Root/files/newspics/DOC_200310811020_50163460823_chempuben03.asp 5)http://www.psc.edu/publicinfo/news/2003/2003-10-09_nobel.html. |
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