Nobel Prize in medicine won by Swedish Scientist Svante Paabo

• Swedish scientist Svante Paabo has won the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• He discovered that gene transfer occurred from extinct hominins to Homo sapiens 70,000 years ago.
• Paabo also discovered a previously unknown hominin, Denisova.

Svante Paabo of Sweden has been awarded the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discoveries “concerning the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution,” according to the awarding body.

Through his pioneering research, Svante Paabo accomplished something seemingly impossible: sequencing the genome of the Neanderthal, an extinct relative of present-day humans. He also made the sensational discovery of a previously unknown hominin, Denisova,” the Nobel committee said on Monday.

The jury emphasised that Paabo, the director of the genetics department at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, had discovered gene transfer from these now-extinct hominins to Homo sapiens following the 70,000-year-old migration out of Africa.

“This ancient flow of genes to present-day humans has physiological relevance today, for example affecting how our immune system reacts to infections”, the jury said.

Furthermore, COVID-19 patients with a snippet of Neanderthal DNA have a higher risk of severe disease complications, according to Paabo’s 2020 study.

The Nobel Committee’s Juleen Zierath told in Stockholm, “Humankind has always been interested in our origins, and Svante Praabo was able to solve part of that puzzle for us by sequencing the genome of some of our closest relatives – the Neanderthal and the Denisova.”

“We now understand better what makes us unique from these close relatives.”

Also Read

Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz calls for windfall profits tax in Australia

A windfall gains tax, according to Joseph Stiglitz, is a "no-brainer" that...