LSIPR 50 2017: Yoshinori Ohsumi

Name: Yoshinori Ohsumi

Organisation: Institute of Innovative Research, Tokyo Institute of Technology

Position: Specially appointed professor

Yoshinori Ohsumi is no stranger to awards and recognition. In 2016, Ohsumi won the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences for his research in autophagy, the recycling system that cells use to generate nutrients from their own inessential or damaged components.

Before that, he was awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery and explanation of mechanisms underlying autophagy (self-cannibalisation).

According to the Nobel Assembly, Ohsumi’s discoveries led to a “new paradigm” in the understanding of how cells recycle their content.

“His discoveries opened the path to understanding the fundamental importance of autophagy in many physiological processes, such as in the adaptation to starvation or response to infection,” said the assembly.