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News:
- The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2018 has been awarded to Frances H. Arnold for the directed evolution of enzymes and to George P. Smith and Sir Gregory P. Winter for the phage display of peptides and antibodies.
Important Facts:
- Significance of discoveries:
- The uses of Frances Arnold’s enzymes include more environmentally friendly manufacturing of chemical substances, such as pharmaceuticals, and the production of renewable fuels for a greener transport sector.
- George Smith developed an elegant method known as phage display, where a bacteriophage (a virus that infects bacteria) can be used to evolve new proteins.
- Gregory Winter used phage display for the directed evolution of antibodies, with the aim of producing new pharmaceuticals.
- The first one based on this method, adalimumab, was approved in 2002 and is used for rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis and inflammatory bowel diseases. Since then, phage display has produced antibodies that can neutralise toxins, counteract autoimmune diseases and cure metastatic cancer.
