Profile of Thomas Südhof, James Rothman, and Randy Schekman, 2013 Nobel Laureates in Physiology or Medicine

Brunger. Jahn. Novick. Rizo-Rey. Rothman. Schekman. Scheller. Südhof. The 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Thomas Südhof, James Rothman, and Randy Schekman for their pioneering studies of membrane vesicle trafficking. In systems as diverse as the human brain and baker's yeast and with approaches from mouse genetics and electrophysiology to enzymology to powerful genetic screens, they have unraveled this process, illuminating basic cell biology. Their studies provide molecular understanding to neurotransmission, regulated insulin secretion, and a host of human diseases. In 1974, Palade and de Duve were recognized for discovering the secretory pathway and demonstrating its directionality through electron microscopy and pulse/chase kinetics in combination with organelle fractionation. Although whole realms of cell biology of comparable complexity were by then understood in some detail, from intermediary metabolism to DNA replication, transcription, and translation, the catalysts and mechanisms of the secretory pathway were completely unknown. In the secretory pathway, newly made proteins are captured in vesicles that bud from the endoplasmic reticulum, fuse to the Golgi, and travel through that organelle into secretory vesicles that fuse at the plasma membrane. Schekman was born in Minnesota and grew up in Los Angeles, saving his money as a lad for his first microscope and entering science fairs. At University of California–Los Angeles, he worked with Dan Ray on bacteriophage replication, and then brought this passion to …