STOCKHOLM: Breast cancer discoveries and mRNA vaccines are seen as potential winners as the Nobel Prize in Medicine begins a week of winner announcements on Monday, with this year’s awards standing in the shadow of war in Europe.
Created more than 120 years ago before Europe was ravaged by two world wars, the Nobel Prizes will reward those who have “conferred the greatest benefit on mankind” after a year marked by bloodshed and devastation in Ukraine.
The medicine prize will be announced around 11:30 a.m. (0930 GMT) in Stockholm on Monday, followed by the physics prizes on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday.
The Peace Prize, the most anticipated of the prizes and the only one announced in Oslo, will follow on Friday, with the Economics Prize concluding on October 10.
On the medical side, a woman’s name keeps coming up on the charts: the American geneticist Mary-Claire King, who in 1990 discovered the BRCA1 gene responsible for a hereditary form of breast cancer.
She could be honored along with oncologists Dennis Slamon from the United States and Germany’s Axel Ullrich for their research, which led to the development of the breast cancer drug Herceptin.
However, if the jury were to break from its tradition of honoring decades-old research, another woman could be well-placed for her role in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic.
Already honored by almost every other major medical award, Hungarian-born Katalin Kariko could win for her pioneering research that directly led to the first mRNA vaccines to fight Covid-19, made by Pfizer and Moderna.
“There is not only the direct benefit this has given us to fight the pandemic, it is also the first of a series of very promising applications using this technology,” Ulrika Bjorksten told AFP. , director of the science department of Swedish public radio.
Kariko could be honored along with collaborator Drew Weissman from the United States and Pieter Cullis from Canada.
Last year, the prize was awarded to American researchers David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian for their discoveries on human temperature and touch receptors.
David Pendlebury, who heads the closely watched analysis group Clarivate, which lists dozens of possible winners for science Nobel prizes, said his money was on King and Slamon this year.
But he also mentioned the Hong Kong molecular biologist Yuk Ming Dennis Lopioneer in the development of non-invasive prenatal tests.
He also developed a new method of detecting cancer early using just a few drops of blood, called liquid biopsy.
With a simple blood test “you can determine all sorts of possible problems and illnesses,” Pendlebury said.
US-based male scholars have overwhelmingly dominated scientific Nobel prizes over the years.
The various award committees have insisted they try to recognize women’s achievements, but say many of the key discoveries were made decades ago when fewer women were involved in high-level research. level.
Last year, 12 men and one woman won the Nobel Prize, with all the science nods going to the men.
For Thursday’s literature prize, literary critics told AFP they believe the Swedish Academy may opt for a more mainstream author this year, having selected lesser-known writers over the past two years.
Last year, Tanzanian author Abdulrazak Gurnah won, while American poet Louise Gluck was crowned in 2020.
American novelist Joyce Carol Oates, French Annie Ernaux and Maryse Conde, Russian Lyudmila Ulitskaya and Canadian Margaret Atwood have all been cited as potential winners if the committee has their eyes on a woman.
However, online betting sites have the Frenchman Michel Houellebecq as the favorite, ahead of the British writer Salman Rushdie, victim of an attempted attack in August.
But it is the price of peace that should be of particular importance this year.
After Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov won the prize last year with his Filipino colleague Maria Ressa in the name of freedom of expression, will the Norwegian Nobel Committee award another anti-Putin prize after the invasion of Ukraine by Moscow?
Not since the Second World War has a conflict raged between two countries so close to Oslo.
The International Criminal Court, charged with investigating war crimes in Ukraine, and the International Court of Justice – both based in The Hague – have been mentioned as possible winners this year.
Thus imprisoned Russian dissident Alexei Navalny and Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.
If the committee should focus on the climate crisis, experts have warned Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, possibly along with British environmentalist David Attenborough or other activists such as Sudanese Nisreen Elsaim and Ghanaian Chibeze Ezekiel.
Created more than 120 years ago before Europe was ravaged by two world wars, the Nobel Prizes will reward those who have “conferred the greatest benefit on mankind” after a year marked by bloodshed and devastation in Ukraine.
The medicine prize will be announced around 11:30 a.m. (0930 GMT) in Stockholm on Monday, followed by the physics prizes on Tuesday, chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday.
The Peace Prize, the most anticipated of the prizes and the only one announced in Oslo, will follow on Friday, with the Economics Prize concluding on October 10.
On the medical side, a woman’s name keeps coming up on the charts: the American geneticist Mary-Claire King, who in 1990 discovered the BRCA1 gene responsible for a hereditary form of breast cancer.
She could be honored along with oncologists Dennis Slamon from the United States and Germany’s Axel Ullrich for their research, which led to the development of the breast cancer drug Herceptin.
However, if the jury were to break from its tradition of honoring decades-old research, another woman could be well-placed for her role in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic.
Already honored by almost every other major medical award, Hungarian-born Katalin Kariko could win for her pioneering research that directly led to the first mRNA vaccines to fight Covid-19, made by Pfizer and Moderna.
“There is not only the direct benefit this has given us to fight the pandemic, it is also the first of a series of very promising applications using this technology,” Ulrika Bjorksten told AFP. , director of the science department of Swedish public radio.
Kariko could be honored along with collaborator Drew Weissman from the United States and Pieter Cullis from Canada.
Last year, the prize was awarded to American researchers David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian for their discoveries on human temperature and touch receptors.
David Pendlebury, who heads the closely watched analysis group Clarivate, which lists dozens of possible winners for science Nobel prizes, said his money was on King and Slamon this year.
But he also mentioned the Hong Kong molecular biologist Yuk Ming Dennis Lopioneer in the development of non-invasive prenatal tests.
He also developed a new method of detecting cancer early using just a few drops of blood, called liquid biopsy.
With a simple blood test “you can determine all sorts of possible problems and illnesses,” Pendlebury said.
US-based male scholars have overwhelmingly dominated scientific Nobel prizes over the years.
The various award committees have insisted they try to recognize women’s achievements, but say many of the key discoveries were made decades ago when fewer women were involved in high-level research. level.
Last year, 12 men and one woman won the Nobel Prize, with all the science nods going to the men.
For Thursday’s literature prize, literary critics told AFP they believe the Swedish Academy may opt for a more mainstream author this year, having selected lesser-known writers over the past two years.
Last year, Tanzanian author Abdulrazak Gurnah won, while American poet Louise Gluck was crowned in 2020.
American novelist Joyce Carol Oates, French Annie Ernaux and Maryse Conde, Russian Lyudmila Ulitskaya and Canadian Margaret Atwood have all been cited as potential winners if the committee has their eyes on a woman.
However, online betting sites have the Frenchman Michel Houellebecq as the favorite, ahead of the British writer Salman Rushdie, victim of an attempted attack in August.
But it is the price of peace that should be of particular importance this year.
After Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov won the prize last year with his Filipino colleague Maria Ressa in the name of freedom of expression, will the Norwegian Nobel Committee award another anti-Putin prize after the invasion of Ukraine by Moscow?
Not since the Second World War has a conflict raged between two countries so close to Oslo.
The International Criminal Court, charged with investigating war crimes in Ukraine, and the International Court of Justice – both based in The Hague – have been mentioned as possible winners this year.
Thus imprisoned Russian dissident Alexei Navalny and Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya.
If the committee should focus on the climate crisis, experts have warned Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, possibly along with British environmentalist David Attenborough or other activists such as Sudanese Nisreen Elsaim and Ghanaian Chibeze Ezekiel.
