Americans Lefkowitz, Kobilka win Nobel chemistry prize for work on protein receptors

Americans Robert Lefkowitz and Brian Kobilka won the 2012 Nobel Prize in chemistry on October 10 for studies of protein receptors that let body cells sense and respond to outside signals. Such studies are key for developing better drugs.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said the two researchers had made groundbreaking discoveries on an important family of receptors, known as G-protein-coupled receptors.

About half of all medications act on these receptors, so learning about them will help scientists to come up with better drugs.

The human body has about 1,000 kinds of such receptors, which let it respond to a wide variety of chemical signals, like adrenaline. Some receptors are in the nose, tongue and eyes, and let us sense smells, tastes and vision.

Dr. Lefkowitz, 69, is an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and professor at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina. Dr. Kobilka, 57, is a professor at Stanford University School of Medicine in California. 

The academy said it was long a mystery how cells interact with their environment and adapt to new situations, such as when adrenaline increases blood pressure and makes the heart beat faster. Scientists suspected that cell surfaces had some type of receptor for hormones.

Using radioactivity, Dr. Lefkowitz managed to unveil receptors including the receptor for adrenaline, and started to understand how it works. Dr. Kobilka’s work helped researchers realize that there is a whole family of receptors that look alike a family that is now called G-protein-coupled receptors. 

The Nobel Prizes were established in the will of 19th century Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. Each award is worth 8 million kronor, or about $1.2 million. The awards are always handed out on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death in 1896.