Autumn invariably brings the turning of the leaves, the shortening of the days, and the Thomson Reuters Nobel Laureate predictions. For the 10th year in a row, the scientific publisher has released its citation-based picks for which scientists will be tapped by the Nobel Prize committee in October.

Thomson Reuters determines the most influential researchers in chemistry, physics, physiology or medicine, and economics by mining citation information from its Web of Knowledge database. Since inaugurating the Nobel predictions in 2002, 26 of the more than 160 total Thomson Reuters "Citation Laureates" have gone on to win actual prizes.

"Our Citation Laureate selection process operates much like the Nobel Foundation’s selection process," said Thomson Reuters citation analyst David Pendlebury in a statement. "We recognize fundamental discoveries and identify the most important contributors to these discoveries. Our Citation Laureates have made such important contributions to science that we believe them...

Here are this year's life-science-relevant predictions:

Physiology or Medicine

  • C. David Allis of Rockefeller University and Michael Grunstein of the University of California, Los Angeles, "for fundamental discoveries concerning histone modifications and their role in genetic regulation"
  • Anthony Hunter of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies "for the discovery of tyrosine phosphorylation and contributions to understanding protein kinases and their role in signal transduction," and Anthony Pawson of the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute of Mount Sinai Hospital and the University of Toronto "for identification of the phosphotyrosine binding SH2 domain and demonstrating its function in protein-protein interactions"
  • Richard Hynes of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Erkki Ruoslahti of the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Masatoshi Takeichi of the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology "for pioneering discoveries of cell adhesion molecules, Hynes and Ruoslahti for integrins and Takeichi for cadherins"

Be sure to check back in with The Scientist in October to find out who actually wins Nobel Prizes in Physiology or Medicine and/or Chemistry.

Interested in reading more?

The Scientist ARCHIVES

Become a Member of

Receive full access to more than 35 years of archives, as well as TS Digest, digital editions of The Scientist, feature stories, and much more!
Join for free todayAlready a member?Login Here