TREG Innovators Win the Crafoord Prize Save

The 2017 Crafoord Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has been awarded to a Japanese scientists and two American scientists for their discovery and research on T regulatory cells (TRegs).

The $6 million Swedish krona (nearly $700,000 USD) prize will be shared by Shimon Sakaguchi of Osaka University, Fred Ramsdell from the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy in San Francisco, and Alexander Rudensky of the New York-based Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Their work on regulatory T cells has been fundamental to understanding the immune derangements associated with autoimmune disease and inflammatory artthritis. 

The Crafoord prize is awarded to a specific scientifc area that rotates each year.  The focus of this year's prize was Polyarthritis.  The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences gives the Crafoord award annually to honor achievements (in astronomy and mathematics, geosciences, biosciences, or polyarthritis) not always covered by the more famous Nobel Prizes.  

Established in 1980 by industrialist Holger Crafoord, the Crafoord Prize recognizes outstanding achievement in the sciences.