屠呦呦荣获医学大奖拉斯克奖，有望再获诺贝尔奖

发布时间：2011/9/25 阅读次数：20599 字体大小: 【小】【中】【大】

屠呦呦荣获医学大奖拉斯克奖，有望再获诺贝尔奖

Tu Youyou Won Lasker Award and Possibly Nobel Prize in Future

新华网报道：

纽约９月２３日电（记者任海军）国际医学大奖——美国拉斯克奖２３日将其２０１１年临床研究奖授予中国中医科学院终身研究员屠呦呦，以表彰她“发现了青蒿素——一种治疗疟疾的药物，在全球特别是发展中国家挽救了数百万人的生命”。这是中国科学家首次获得拉斯克奖。

拉斯克奖评审委员会认为，屠呦呦教授领导的团队将一种古老的中医疗法转化为最强有力的抗疟疾药，使现代技术与传统中医师们留下的遗产相结合，将其中最宝贵的内容带入２１世纪。

“在人类的药物史上，我们如此庆祝一项能缓解数亿人疼痛和压力、并挽救上百个国家数百万人生命的发现的机会并不常有，”斯坦福大学教授、拉斯克奖评审委员会成员露西·夏皮罗在讲述青蒿素发现的意义时说。夏皮罗表示，青蒿素这一高效抗疟药的发现很大程度上归因于屠呦呦及其团队的“洞察力、视野和顽强信念”，屠教授的工作为世界提供了过去半个世纪里最重要的药物干预方案。

在发表获奖感言时，屠呦呦衷心感谢为青蒿素的发现和应用作出重要贡献的同事。她表示，青蒿素的发现是中国传统医学给人类的一份礼物，传统中医药多年来一直服务中国和亚洲人民，开发传统医药，必将给世界带来更多的治疗药物。她呼吁开展全球性合作，使中医药和其他传统医药更好地造福人类健康。

上世纪六、七十年代，在科研条件极为艰苦的环境下，屠呦呦团队与国内其他机构合作，经过艰苦卓绝的努力并从《肘后备急方》等中医古典文献中获取灵感，先驱性地发现了青蒿素，开创了疟疾治疗新方法，世界数亿人因此受益。目前，一种以青蒿素为基础的复方药物已经成为疟疾的标准治疗方案，世界卫生组织将青蒿素和相关药剂列入其“基本药品”目录。

“屠教授的成就是所有传染病领域最重要的成就之一，屠教授作出了主要贡献，值得获奖，”美国国家过敏和传染病研究所所长安东尼·福奇在出席颁奖仪式时对新华社记者说，“这也是中国传统医药可以引导发现青蒿素这样有用化合物的好例子。”

拉斯克奖由有“现代广告之父”之称的美国广告经理人阿尔伯特·拉斯克和夫人玛丽·拉斯克于１９４６年创立，以表彰在医学研究领域作出突出贡献的在世科学家、医学研究者和公共服务人员或机构。自创立以来，共有３００多位科学家获奖，其中８０位最后获诺贝尔奖。拉斯克奖素有“美国诺贝尔奖”之称。

外电报道：

Tu Youyou, discoverer of malarial drug, wins Lasker Award

A scientist who discovered a powerful malaria drug and two others who illuminated how proteins fold within cells have won prestigious medical awards.

The Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation announced the $250,000 prizes Monday and will present them Sept. 23 in New York.

Tu Youyou, 81, of the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences in Beijing, won the clinical research award for discovering the malaria drug artemisinin (ar-tuh-MIHS'-ihn-ihn), which the foundation said has saved millions of lives.

In the late 1960s, as part of a Chinese government project, Tu began combing ancient texts and folk remedies to find a treatment for malaria. She collected 2,000 potential recipes, from which her team made 380 extracts. One extract, from sweet wormwood, showed promise in mouse studies. Following a clue from an ancient document, Tu redesigned the extraction process to make the extract more potent. In the early 1970s, she and her colleagues isolated the active ingredient, artemisinin.

The Lasker award for basic research is shared by Dr. Franz-Ulrich Hartl, 54, of the Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry in Martinsried, Germany, and Dr. Arthur Horwich, 60, of Yale University. Their key discoveries about how proteins fold within cells may someday help scientists find new treatments for such illnesses as Alzheimer's, Huntington's and Lou Gehrig's diseases, the foundation said.

Before their work, scientists thought that proteins needed no help to fold into their proper shapes. But in the late 1980s, the two men discovered that the folding happens within a cage-like structure that promotes the process.

"They gave the medical world a key understanding of how proteins reach their biological potential," the foundation said.

A third Lasker prize, for public service, was awarded to the Clinical Center of the National Institutes of Health. Since 1953, the center has been "a model research hospital, providing innovative therapy and high-quality patient care, treating rare and severe diseases and producing outstanding physician-scientists," the foundation said.

The Lasker foundation was established in 1942. Albert Lasker was an advertising executive who died in 1952. His wife Mary was a longtime champion of medical research before her death in 1994.

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