Funny anecdote that Dr. Brunkow thought she was being spammed when the Nobel Committee tried to inform her:
>Brunkow, meanwhile, got the news of her prize from an AP photographer who came to her Seattle home in the early hours of the morning. She said she had ignored the earlier call from the Nobel Committee. “My phone rang and I saw a number from Sweden and thought: ‘That’s just, that’s spam of some sort.’”
Am I understanding correctly that this Nobel prize is for work that was completed over 20 years ago? I'm not a biologist but it sounds like they discovered regulatory T cells together, which sounds relatively major. Is it typical for a Nobel prize to lag that kind of discovery for decades? Or is it only now that we understand how major the discovery was? Or maybe I'm just misunderstanding the discovery and the timeline.
I can’t say I would react too differently. There are so many emails or phone calls claiming you’ve won a big award or sum of money that end up being scams.
It’s interesting that two of the two American recipients weren’t recognized by other awards like membership in the National Academy of Sciences or the National Academy of Medicine. Truly black horse candidates which makes this fun.
Very excited to live in a timeline where autoimmune diseases could be cured. 40 people are already in remission from Lupus in a trial conducted last year.
There's usually two pieces, a short one that can be taken as is for the general press and another which goes more in depth at a university level I would say.
It's a win for nominative determinism. The name Shimon, in Japanese, directly translates to something like "Determined Scholar."
It's also a fairly weird and old fashioned name. The sort of thing that would have been in style 120 years ago. (Meiji and early Taisho era.) Japanese names today are usually less literal.
In the past here on HN, someone spoke of a set of books that were an incredible resource on the body’s immune response. Does anyone know which books those were? I’m assuming they will get an update to include info on T-reg.
I'd use Abbas' Immunology as a standard textbook and Sompayrac's How The Immune System Works as a more straightforward, lean book on the immune system.
These discoveries are old enough to be in the textbooks already.
Not sure what would be good popular science books. There is quite a lot on the immune system in the Alberts (Molecular Biology of the Cell), but that is maybe too much without solid biology background knowledge. The typical textbook is the Janeway (Immunology), but that's certainly too much.
What I liked as an introductory textbook in general was Campbell Biology, but that covers essentially all of Biology. There is a chapter on the immune system as well.
All those books are horribly expensive in the US, and still quite expensive in other countries, though.
I don’t know the post you’re referring to but I highly recommend How the Immune System Works by Lauren Sompayrac. It explains the interesting parts without getting bogged down in the details of every signalling pathway, but without dumbing things down too much.
The economics one stands out for not being endowed by Nobel but instead Sveriges Riksbank well after his death (thus it's the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences).
But it's administered by the Nobel Foundation, etc.
Giving the prize to Obama, whose main achievement at the time was not to be Bush, was a disgrace and did huge damage to the image of the committee. And he did nothing after that that would have deserved a prize.
> Although the Prize in Economic Sciences was not one of the original five Nobel Prizes established by Alfred Nobel's will, it is considered a member of the Nobel Prize system, and is administered and referred to along with the Nobel Prizes by the Nobel Foundation. Winners of the Prize in Economic Sciences are chosen in a similar manner to and announced alongside the Nobel Prize recipients, and receive the Prize in Economic Sciences at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony.
> FOXDIE (originally rendered as FoxDie) was an engineered retrovirus developed by the DIA for the Pentagon. It was programmed to kill specific people by recognizing a person's DNA, causing cardiac arrest.
Funny anecdote that Dr. Brunkow thought she was being spammed when the Nobel Committee tried to inform her:
>Brunkow, meanwhile, got the news of her prize from an AP photographer who came to her Seattle home in the early hours of the morning. She said she had ignored the earlier call from the Nobel Committee. “My phone rang and I saw a number from Sweden and thought: ‘That’s just, that’s spam of some sort.’”
https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/2025/10/sc...
Meanwhile, Fred Ramsdell probably still doesn’t know he’s won it because he’s backpacking in Idaho.
He’ll be in for a surprise when he switches his phone back on.
Am I understanding correctly that this Nobel prize is for work that was completed over 20 years ago? I'm not a biologist but it sounds like they discovered regulatory T cells together, which sounds relatively major. Is it typical for a Nobel prize to lag that kind of discovery for decades? Or is it only now that we understand how major the discovery was? Or maybe I'm just misunderstanding the discovery and the timeline.
Yes, many Nobel prizes are awarded for work that was completed decades ago in part to ensure that the work passes the test of time.
I can’t say I would react too differently. There are so many emails or phone calls claiming you’ve won a big award or sum of money that end up being scams.
It’s interesting that two of the two American recipients weren’t recognized by other awards like membership in the National Academy of Sciences or the National Academy of Medicine. Truly black horse candidates which makes this fun.
Very excited to live in a timeline where autoimmune diseases could be cured. 40 people are already in remission from Lupus in a trial conducted last year.
I love how Nobel Prize always have a "popular information" with nice layman description of what was discovered and why it was important. From the sidebar: https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2025/popular-info...
There's usually two pieces, a short one that can be taken as is for the general press and another which goes more in depth at a university level I would say.
There are actually three
The press release https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2025/press-releas...
The popular science article https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2025/popular-info...
And an advanced scientific paper usually written by the members of the commitee https://www.nobelprize.org/uploads/2025/10/advanced-medicine...
And then later on there's of course the recipient's Nobel lecture, most of which are fantastic.
Indeed!
It's a win for nominative determinism. The name Shimon, in Japanese, directly translates to something like "Determined Scholar."
It's also a fairly weird and old fashioned name. The sort of thing that would have been in style 120 years ago. (Meiji and early Taisho era.) Japanese names today are usually less literal.
His name could be interpreted as "aspiring to be a scholar". I guess he's done an exceptional job living up to it.
In the past here on HN, someone spoke of a set of books that were an incredible resource on the body’s immune response. Does anyone know which books those were? I’m assuming they will get an update to include info on T-reg.
I'd use Abbas' Immunology as a standard textbook and Sompayrac's How The Immune System Works as a more straightforward, lean book on the immune system.
As a general introduction I quite like this one: https://shop-us.kurzgesagt.org/products/immune-a-journey-int...
These discoveries are old enough to be in the textbooks already.
Not sure what would be good popular science books. There is quite a lot on the immune system in the Alberts (Molecular Biology of the Cell), but that is maybe too much without solid biology background knowledge. The typical textbook is the Janeway (Immunology), but that's certainly too much.
What I liked as an introductory textbook in general was Campbell Biology, but that covers essentially all of Biology. There is a chapter on the immune system as well.
All those books are horribly expensive in the US, and still quite expensive in other countries, though.
I don’t know the post you’re referring to but I highly recommend How the Immune System Works by Lauren Sompayrac. It explains the interesting parts without getting bogged down in the details of every signalling pathway, but without dumbing things down too much.
“How the immune system works”, Lauren Sompayrac
Ah it's the Nobel Prize week! If anyone curious about this week's schedule:
Tuesday: physics. Wednesday: chemistry. Thursday: literature. Friday: peace. Monday: economics.
It still kind of baffles me that there’s no Nobel prize for mathematics.
I know there are plenty of other math awards out there, so it’s not really “worse” or anything, I have always just thought it was a weird omission.
obligatory comment about how economics one isn't a Nobel prize.
Next Monday also isn’t in this week so it all works out.
I think it's more the Nobel Peace Prize that stands out.
The peace prize stands out for being different.
The economics one stands out for not being endowed by Nobel but instead Sveriges Riksbank well after his death (thus it's the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences).
But it's administered by the Nobel Foundation, etc.
The Peace Prize stands out because sometimes it is given to someone who wages war such as Henry Kissinger or Barack Obama.
Giving the prize to Obama, whose main achievement at the time was not to be Bush, was a disgrace and did huge damage to the image of the committee. And he did nothing after that that would have deserved a prize.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_Memorial_Prize_in_Econom...
> Although the Prize in Economic Sciences was not one of the original five Nobel Prizes established by Alfred Nobel's will, it is considered a member of the Nobel Prize system, and is administered and referred to along with the Nobel Prizes by the Nobel Foundation. Winners of the Prize in Economic Sciences are chosen in a similar manner to and announced alongside the Nobel Prize recipients, and receive the Prize in Economic Sciences at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony.
First pattern that comes into mind after reading about a gene called "Foxp3" and immune targets:
Man frantically shakes whole body, then raises dramatically his fist and screams: - FOX...
Metal Gear..?
https://breezewiki.com/metalgear/wiki/FOXDIE
> FOXDIE (originally rendered as FoxDie) was an engineered retrovirus developed by the DIA for the Pentagon. It was programmed to kill specific people by recognizing a person's DNA, causing cardiac arrest.