THE LASKER FOUNDATION
The 2011 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, announced today, goes to Franz-Ulrich Hartl of the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry and Arthur L. Horwich of Yale University School of Medicine for their work on protein folding, which when compromised can lead to neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Specifically, the pair identified the cage-like structure known as chaperonin that protects nascent protein from becoming tangled with other proteins as it guides the folding process, ScienceNOW reports.
The Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation is also recognizing Tu Youyou of the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences with its Lasker~DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award for her discovery of artemisinin, an anti-malarial drug that has “saved millions of lives across the globe, especially in ...