Yoshinori Ohsumi

is a Japanese cell biologist specializing in autophagy, the process that cells use to destroy and recycle cellular components.

Ohsumi is a professor at Institute of Science Tokyo's Institute of Innovative Research. He received the Kyoto Prize for Basic Sciences in 2012, the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, and the 2017 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences for his discoveries of mechanisms for autophagy.

Biography

Ohsumi was born on February 9, 1945, in Fukuoka. He received a B.Sci. in 1967 and a D.Sci. in 1974, both from the University of Tokyo. In 1974–77 he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Rockefeller University in New York City.

Christian de Duve coined the term autophagy in 1963 whereas Ohsumi began his work in 1988. Prior to that time, less than 20 papers per year were published on this subject. During the 1990s, Ohsumi's group described the morphology of autophagy in yeast, and performed mutational screening on yeast cells that identified essential genes for cells to be capable of autophagy.

In 2016, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for his discoveries of mechanisms for autophagy". He is the 25th Japanese person to be awarded a Nobel Prize. Ohsumi's spouse Mariko, a Professor at Teikyo University of Science, collaborated on his research. She is a co-author of many academic papers with him. In 2024 Ohsumi donated his Nobel Prize medal and diploma to the Institute of Science Tokyo to "serve as a strong stimulus for young researchers who seek to create the future".

Recognition

Source: 2013 – Thomson Reuters Citation Laureate 2015 – Gairdner Foundation International Award 2015 – International Prize for Biology 2015 – Keio Medical Science Prize 2015 – Person of Cultural Merit 2015 – Rosenstiel Award 2016 – Wiley Prize in Biomedical Sciences 2016 – Dr. Paul Janssen Award for Biomedical Research 2016 – Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2016 and 2017 – Asian Scientist 100, Asian Scientist 2017 – Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences 2017 – Honorary doctorate from Kyoto University, Japan

Selected publications

His original findings about autophagy in yeast cells:

Follow up with more research on yeast:

Others