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2007-9-26
Pick-up of insulin was a good news to thousands of patients who are simply lack of insulin. Although diabetes is not curable, the symptom could still be relieved only if insulin is injected in right time with proper amount. With the help of insulin, longevity and decent living standard become possible.
Crude extract by Frederick Grant Banting and Best, Charles Herbert was effective to diabetes in some extent, but its purity was not in the standard for injection. It could be said that J.J.R. Macleod's invitation to James Collip was the key to the success. After all, purification of protein is biochemist's profession. In the help of Mr. Collip, Mr. Banting and Mr. Macleod obtained insulin that was suitable for clinical treatment. On Jan. 11, 1922, Tompson, a 14-year-old boy, became the first person who received insulin injection and showed distinctive curative result. Banting and Macleod won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine 1923 because of this accomplishment.
In 1943, British chemist Sanger embarked on measuring the first-order structure of protein. At that time, scientific community was not in consensus whether this kind of bio-macromolecule like protein could stay in a stable molecular composition. Sanger spent 10 years to improve the purification technique of Collip targeting at insulin (fortunately insulin is a simple structure protein), obtained crystalloid and finally affirmed its first-order structure in 1953. This told us that protein was certain to have stable amino acid composition and marshaling sequence, and yet the vital role of this research in life science helped Sanger win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1958. His protein sequencing method raised a revolution about protein research. Nowadays, the relation between the protein structure and function is one of the important parts of life science research.
When Sanger was busy in sequencing insulin, a female scientist Rosalyn Yalow and his college Solomon Berson found that there were synalbumin antibodies in the blood serum of people who were injected with insulin for a long time, which was on account that early insulin came from animals¡¯ pancreas. Although animals' insulin was quite similar to that of human beings, it would still cause alarm to our immune system. In 1955, they contributed their paper about this discovery to Journal of Clinical Research. However, it was a pity that their discovery was not approved by the Journal and then was not published. And yet, Yalow did not give up her correct understanding, but rather further developed it to radioimmunoassay (RIA) method that can measure the microhormone in the blood and any substance that can produce antibodies, which completely changed condition of endocrinology research. Yalow won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine 1977. Now, on the basis of genetic engineering, we obtained human recombinant insulin and settled annoying anaphylatoxis resulting from antibodies by and large.
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Organizer:
Beijing Municipal Association for Science & Technology
Undertaker: Beijing Science & Technology
Consulting Center,
Information Center of Beijing Municipal Association for
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