News from Nobelprize.org
February 23, 2007
Second only to tuberculosis as a threat to health worldwide, malaria kills well over a million people a year. Our understanding of the disease has its roots in work performed by several scientists over a hundred years ago, and 2007 marks the centenary of the award of the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine to Alphonse Laveran, father of the field of protozoan pathology, and demonstrator of the infection of human cells by the malaria-causing parasite.
His award followed Ronald Ross’s 1902 Nobel Prize for showing how the parasite, a single-celled ‘protozoa’, is actually transmitted from mosquitoes to other organisms. Ross’s Nobel Citation concludes with the optimistic words that his work “has laid the foundation for successful research on this disease and methods of combating it”.
A century on, the fight continues. One recently resuscitated weapon in the battle brings in another Nobel Prize connection; DDT, the insecticide for which Paul Müller received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Having been subject to a 30-year worldwide ban, DDT was last year again recommended by the World Health Organization for indoor spraying in malarial regions, marking something of a reversal of fortune for this notorious molecule.
Follow the links below to discover a sample of Nobelprize.org’s wealth of content, and do please let us know what you think by e-mailing us at editor@nobelprize.org.
Adam Smith
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THE 'PROTO' PROTOZOAN DISEASE
A hundred years ago Alphonse Laveran was awarded his Nobel Prize for opening-up the new world of protozoan diseases, of which malaria was the first demonstrated example. In his Nobel Lecture he sets the scene for his research and succinctly describes his major contributions to the field.
Read the lecture » |
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CONTROLLING THE SPREAD OF MALARIA
Learn more about the transmission of the disease by playing our educational games, in which the player gets to drive first the mosquito, and then the parasite, past a variety of the barriers to infection.
Play the games »
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THIS IS NOT A SPADE
In a highly accessible new article introducing the work of Seamus Heaney, Nobel Laureate in Literature for 1995, Ola Larsmo explores the development of the poet's style over four decades of writing.
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"THE ATMOSPHERE IN THE STREETS IS TRANSFORMED"
We recently visited John Hume, co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998, at home in Northern Ireland, to interview him about the path that lead to his Prize, and the evolving peace process.
Watch the interview » |
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AND THE NOMINATIONS ARE …
The annual deadline for nominations for a Nobel Prize is February 1st, but the identity of those nominated is kept secret for 50 years. Uniquely, the Norwegian Nobel Committee at least reveals the number of nominations it receives; 181 names this year, 46 of which are organizations. Find out more about the nomination process from our dedicated fact sheet.
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THE BOOK CLUB
OK, so you might not be eligible to nominate anyone for a Nobel Prize, but you can at least give the world your opinion of a Nobel Laureate's published work. Use our simple recommendation form to tell others why they should read a particular Laureate’s book.
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ALAN MACDIARMID, 1927-2007
One of the three recipients of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the discovery of conductive polymers, the New Zealander Alan MacDiarmid died on February 7th aged 79. His autobiography, which in particular tells the story of how his impoverished beginnings actually brought a great richness to his life, makes inspiring reading.
Read the autobiography » |
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