Salute to Mr Steinman,2011 Nobel prize winner for medicine

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Nobel laureate scientist dies days before award

Three scientists who unlocked secrets of the body’s immune system, opening doors to new vaccines and cancer treatments, won the 2011 Nobel prize for medicine yesterday.

American Bruce Beutler and French biologist Jules Hoffmann, who studied the first stages of immune responses to attack, share the $1.5 million (€1.1 million) award with Canadian-born Ralph Steinman, whose discovery of dendritic cells in the 1970s is key to understanding the body’s next line of defence against disease.

However, within minutes of the award being announced, a problem arose. It emerged that one of the three, Mr Steinman, had died of cancer just three days before he could be told of his award. A sufferer of pancreatic cancer, he used his own discoveries to extend his life.

Colleagues of Mr Steinman (68) at Rockefeller University in New York called it a “bittersweet” honour.