Which Scientists Might Be Honored With The Nobel Prize?

Forecasting who will walk away with the Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology is hardly a precise science. Yet there are at least two indicators that have consistently pointed to prize-winning potential. One is a scientist's citation ranking; there is an unusually high correlation between citation frequency and Nobel recognition. The second indicator is the winning of one of the so-called predictor prizes that traditionally anticipate Nobel committee selections. As Columbia University sociologist Harriet Zuckerman writes in her book, Scientific Elite (New York: Free Press, 1977, page 188), a study of American science laureates, "Citation analysis of the work of prospective laureates on the eve of their awards confirms what any scientist knows. Nobel prizes do not go to unknowns." Last year's winners are an example. J. Michael Bishop and Harold E. Varmus, both of the University of California, San Francisco, are citation superstars. (Indeed, both were included in The Scientist's list of 1989 Nobel contenders [The Scientist, Oct. 2, 1989, page 14].) Chosen for their discovery of proto-oncogenes, the pair rank within the 100 most cited scientists of the period 1973 to 1984, according to the Philadelphia-based Institute for Scientific Information's Science Citation Index (SCI) database. Bishop received more than 10,000 citations during this period and was the 24th most cited scientist; Varmus ranked 55th, with more than 8,700 citations. Both Bishop and Varmus were among the top 100 scientists (out of 1.3 million) for the period 1981 to 1988. Bishop ranked 13th, with more than 9,000 citations, while Varmus, who had in excess of 6,000 citations, ranked 48th. "Predictor" prizes include the Gairdner International Award and the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award. Indeed, since the Lasker Foundation began making annual awards for biomedical research in 1944, 49 Lasker winners have gone on to receive the Nobel Prize. The Lasker Foundation, which briefly suspended its awards program (The Scientist, March 19, 1990, page 7), recently announced that it will resume it in 1991. There are still, however, many past winners of this coveted prize who have yet to receive the Nobel. The Scientist used these two indicators (distinguished citation records and "predictor" prizes) as criteria in compiling a list of likely candidates for the 1990 Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology, the third installment in a three-part series. (The first two installments appeared in The Scientist, Sept. 3, 1990, and Sept. 17, 1990, both page 16). Most of these scientists of Nobel class either rank among the most cited scientists during the periods 1973 to 1984 and 1981 to 1988, or have garnered prestigious honors such as the Lasker Award, or both. The choice of study period is arbitrary. The files used were created with the purpose of identifying candidates not noted in previous ISI studies. Complete information on any candidate can be obtained from ISI's Science Citation Index files, either on-line or on CD-ROM. (See the accompanying table for a list of the 100 most cited scientists--or "Citation Superstars," as The Scientist calls them--for the period 1981 to 1988.) Most of The Scientist's Nobel "nominees" for this year were on last year's roster of candidates as well. Using the criteria of citation histories and prizes won, however, will understandably lead to researchers who are members of a "scientific elite." Just because these scientists didn't win the Nobel Prize last year doesn't mean that they are no longer in the running this year. Critics have occasionally faulted the Nobel committee for limiting the number who can share any one prize to three. To many, this rule is outdated and does not reflect the fact that many important projects these days are group enterprises. However, the Nobel Prize inherently is individually oriented and recognizes scientists whose overall body of work has provided extraordinary contributions to the field. Two examples are Pierre Chambon of the Institute of Biological Chemistry in Strasbourg, France, and Sydney Brenner of the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, U.K. These two molecular biologists have each produced more than 50 highly cited papers (cited more than 50 times each--a status achieved by about one out of every 50 papers published). Chambon, a leader in gene structure and regulation, has consistently ranked high among cited researchers throughout his career. He ranked 431st during the period 1965 to 1978, 53rd in 1973 to 1984, and 15th for the period 1981 to 1988. Brenner's research on genetic differentiation showed that there are hundreds of sites within the gene where mutation takes place; he also performed pioneering work on the genetic code. Brenner is within the top 1,000 cited scientists for the period 1965 to 1978. The work that Brenner and Chambon have done together has helped further the understanding of human genetic disease and has formed the basis for clinical treatment of many of these diseases. The pair was awarded the 1987 Pras Harvey (Harvey Prize) of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology. Brenner was honored with the 1971 Lasker Basic Medical Research Award and the 1978 Gairdner Award. The key to forecasting a Nobel Prize lies in finding the research area that piques the selection committee's interest. Should the Nobel committee this year choose to recognize work in signal transduction, then two likely "nominees" are Michael J. Berridge of the University of Cambridge, England, and Yasutomi Nishizuka of Kobe University School of Medicine, Japan. Both of these stellar researchers are known for their studies in signal transduction--the process that enables cells to use hormones, growth factors, and neurotransmitters to communicate with each other. Berridge's work, which has focused on the early stages in signal transduction, has elucidated the role of second messengers that carry hormone signals into the cell interior. Berridge found that polyphosphoinositides liberate calcium ions that serve as second messengers. With more than 10,000 citations to the papers he published from 1981 to 1988, he ranked 11th among the researchers cited during this period. Nishizuka has studied enzyme activity that is altered by second messengers. In the early 1980s, he discovered protein kinase C, which is triggered by carcinogens to spur cell growth. His paper ("The role of protein kinase C in cell surface signal transduction and tumor production," Nature, 308: 693-8, 1984) is the single most cited paper of the 1980s (The Scientist, Jan. 8, 1990, page 18). Like Berridge, Nishizuka ranked among the top researchers for the period 1981 to 1988; he ranked sixth, with more than 11,500 citations to his credit. In 1988, Nishizuka and Berridge received the Gairdner Award. In 1989, they won the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award, along with two other pillars in signal transduction research--Alfred G. Gilman from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, and Edwin G. Krebs of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute at the University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle. The Lasker Foundation noted that the work of these four scientists "is helping other scientists to understand the origins of major health problems such as psychiatric disorders, hypertension, and cancer, and is already guiding the development of highly specific new drugs and therapeutic approaches to these crucial medical conditions." Both Gilman and Krebs have impressive citation histories. Gilman ranked 277th during the period 1965 to 1978, within the top 1,000 for the period 1973 to 1984, and 57th during 1981 to 1988. Krebs ranked 193rd in 1965 to 1978, 475th in 1973 to 1984, and was among the top 1,000cited scientists of 1981 to 1988. AIDS research has received much attention over the last decade. And certainly Robert C. Gallo of the National Institutes of Health and Luc Montagnier of the Pasteur Institute, credited with identifying the retrovirus that causes AIDS, have been influential in the field. Gallo was the 37th most cited scientist during the period 1973 to 1984. He skyrocketed to the No. 1 cited researcher for the period 1981 to 1988. Gallo received the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award in 1982; he shared the 1986 Lasker Clinical Medical Research Award and the 1987 Gairdner Award with Montagnier. While Montagnier does not have the same citation standing as Gallo, he is among the top 300 scientists cited during the period 1981 to 1988. Even with these strong Nobel indicators, it is possible that the Nobel committee may not choose these top AIDS researchers this year because Gallo has been under investigation by NIH since November 1989 regarding the question of whether the AIDS virus he identified in key documents he published was in fact based on samples donated from Montagnier's lab. Another contributor to the field of AIDS research is molecular biologist Leroy Hood of the California Institute of Technology. Hood's work has greatly enhanced the immunogenetics field, including AIDS investigations. Hood ranked 121st among cited scientists for the period 1973 to 1984. His research on recombination of the antibody genome has catapulted him to the fourth most cited scientist for the period 1981 to 1988. And his identification of the HIV-1 binding site makes him an AIDS-research superstar. Hood, with Susumu Tonegawa of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Philip Leder, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Senior Investigator at Harvard University, won the 1987 Lasker Basic Medical Research Award for their elucidating contributions to the mechanism of antibody diversity. Leder was one of the top scientists during the period 1981 to 1988. He ranked 29th, with more than 7,000 citations. Leder has won the 1985 Bristol-Myers Award for Distinguished Achievement in Cancer Research and the 1983 Pras Harvey. His studies of the c-myc oncogene have unraveled crucial information about carcinogenic cell growth. Determining exactly how various chemical compounds affect the human brain is a challenging endeavor--one at which Solomon H. Snyder of Johns Hopkins University excells. Best known for his research on opiate receptors, Snyder has contributed to more than 100 papers that have been cited more than 50 times each. This constant flow of articles has placed Snyder among the most cited researchers for the past 25 years. During the period 1965 to 1978, he ranked sixth; for 1973 to 1984, he ranked No. 1 (with more than 29,000 citations); and during the last decade, he ranked 26th. Snyder's coauthor on his most cited paper (Science, 179:1011-4, 1973) was Candace B. Pert of the National Institute of Mental Health. Pert is also a highly cited author: She ranked 130th during the period 1973 to 1984. During the last decade, she was among the top 0.2 percent of cited researchers. It is possible that if the Nobel committee chooses to honor Snyder's work, Pert could very well share the prize. Another key player in the opiate receptor game is Hans W. Kosterlitz of the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. Kosterlitz also ranked among the top 0.2 percent of cited researchers for 1981 to 1988 and received the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award with Snyder in 1978. Some extraordinary advancements have been made over the last decade in identifying the defective genes of many of the 4,000 human diseases caused by single-gene disorders. New experimental design and technologies not available a decade ago have helped pave the way for the rapid identification of disease-causing genes. A pioneer in this gene hunt who may well attract the attention of the Nobel committee is Louis M. Kunkel, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Associate Investigator at Children's Hospital in Boston and Harvard Medical School. Kunkel led the painstaking search for the gene that causes Duchenne muscular dystrophy. He was awarded the 1989 Gairdner Award, along with Ronald G. Worton of the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. A relatively new player in the research arena, Kunkel has yet to accrue the citation ranking equal to other Nobel contenders. Yet he could very well catch up. Between 1981 and 1988, Kunkel accrued almost 2,000 citations of his works. Another key geneticist is Francis S. Collins of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. In 1989, in collaboration with Lap-Chee Tsui and Jack R. Riordan of the University of Toronto, he located the defective gene that causes cystic fibrosis. Earlier this year, Collins led one of the teams that successfully identified the neurofibromatosis gene. This gene is one of the first ones identified that has at least three other genes embedded in its structure. Collins, like Kunkel and Worton, has yet to achieve "citation superstardom." That's not to say, however, that the Nobel committee would disqualify such promising investigators. If the Nobel committee had to choose winners only from this small list of scientists, its task would be merely extraordinarily difficult. But the number of potential researchers of Nobel caliber far exceeds this sampling, putting those who must decide on one, or at the most three, in an unenviable position. Lisa Holland is a freelance science writer based in Danbury, Conn.

Which Scientists Might Be Honored With The Nobel Prize?

Interested in reading more?

Become a Member of