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Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, of the University Department of Genetics, wins prestigious award

Lasker Awards: Often called the American 'Nobels'

2005 Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research will be presented to Edwin Southern of the University of Oxford (UK) and Alec Jeffreys of the University of Leicester (UK)

NEW YORK: Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, inventor of DNA genetic fingerprinting at the University of Leicester, will be one of two recipients of the Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research on Friday September 23 at the Pierre Hotel in New York City.

Now celebrating its 60th anniversary, the Lasker Awards are the US's most distinguished honour for outstanding contributions to basic and clinical medical research, as well as public service on behalf of the medical research enterprise.

Often called "America's Nobels," the Lasker Awards have honoured 70 scientists who subsequently went on to receive the Nobel Prize, including 19 in the last 15 years.

The 2005 Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research will be presented to Edwin Southern of the University of Oxford (UK) and Alec Jeffreys of the University of Leicester (UK) for development of two powerful technologies-Southern hybridization and DNA fingerprinting-that together revolutionized human genetics and forensic diagnostics.

Dr. Joseph L. Goldstein, recipient of the 1985 Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research and the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1985 (both with Michael S. Brown) for discoveries regarding cholesterol, is Chairman of the international jury of researchers that selects recipients of the Lasker Awards. He explained the significance of this year's Basic Research and Clinical Research Awards with the following comments:

"Occasionally scientists take special note of an observation or interpret it in a novel way. These "eureka moments" can profoundly alter the course of scientific progress.

"The Lasker Clinical Research Award honours two investigators who transformed human genetic analysis. Their work eventually led to the mapping of the human genome.

Edwin Southern invented a method for detecting subtle DNA differences among individuals and Alec Jeffreys exploited this technique, developing a way to distinguish all humans-except for those who are genetically identical-from each other.

Southern's "eureka moment" came when he noticed how porous the agarose gels were that scientists use for separating DNA fragments of different size. Immediately, he realized that he could harness this property to transfer DNA from the gels to a filter. This advance sparked rapid progress in genetic analysis because suddenly scientists could search for sequences of interest on an easily manipulated solid membrane. Within several years of the development of this technique, scientists were exploiting it for many purposes. They employed it, for example, to pinpoint mutations associated with inherited diseases, an endeavor that has allowed for prenatal diagnosis of diseases such as sickle cell anemia and thalassemia.

"Alec Jeffreys, interested in uncovering genetic variation in different populations, put Southern's "blot" to work in numerous ways. One project involved analyzing repeated DNA segments carried by all humans. At 9:05 a.m. on Monday, September 10, 1984, he took one of his Southern blots out of the developing tank and noticed something thrilling. The pattern of the repeated stretches varied from person to person-and it generated a unique genetic "fingerprint" of an individual. Furthermore, the patterns were passed on from parent to child, so each child carries half of each parent's fingerprint. By the end of the day, he was making a list of applications for his finding; he realized that it could be used for forensics, in transplant biology, to establish family relationships, and for a multitude of other human and non-human problems. Since then, his predictions about the utility of the method not only have been borne out, but have been surpassed."

The Lasker Awards, first presented in 1946, are administered by the Albert & Mary Lasker Foundation. The late Mary Lasker is widely recognized for her singular contribution to the growth of the National Institutes of Health and her unflagging commitment to government funding of medical research in the hope of curing devastating diseases. Her support for medical research spanned five decades, during which she was the nation's foremost citizen-activist on behalf of medical science.

Lasker Award recipients receive a citation highlighting their achievements, and an inscribed statuette of the Winged Victory of Samothrace, the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation's traditional symbol representing humanity's victory over disability, disease, and death. Recipients of the Lasker Awards for Basic and Clinical Medical Research also receive an honorarium.

Alec Jeffreys' reaction to receiving this accolade was:

"This is a huge and entirely unexpected honour and a great tribute to DNA fingerprinting. I am particularly delighted to be sharing the prize with Sir Ed Southern, a good personal friend of many years and the inventor of DNA technologies without which DNA fingerprinting would have been impossible."

Vice-Chancellor of the University of Leicester Professor Robert Burgess said:

"The Lasker Award is an enormous tribute to the exceptional talent of Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys who made his world famous discovery here at the University of Leicester.

"We are extremely proud to count him amongst our colleagues. He is an inspiration to staff and students alike. His work has had a revolutionary impact on science and society and demonstrates the importance and value of world-class research.

"Leicester is all the richer for having him in our midst and we salute him on this momentous occasion of being honoured with the Lasker Award."

Dr. Annette Cashmore, Head of the Department of Genetics, said:

"When Alec Jeffreys joined the Department of Genetics in 1977 he was already making major advances in our understanding of the organisation of genomes, but it is, of course, the discovery of DNA fingerprinting in 1984, for which he is most famous. DNA fingerprinting not only had a major scientific impact but has also affected the lives of millions of people world wide. Since then he has received numerous awards and prizes but the Lasker award is scientifically the most prestigious, and all of us are immensely proud that Alec has been recognised in this way.

"Despite his eminence as a scientist, Alec still spends a large proportion of his time working at the bench and he still teaches both postgraduate and undergraduate students. I'm sure that all of our students will also be proud of Alec when they learn of this recent award. Alec's passion for his science, and the people that are affected by it is infectious, and this plays a key role in fostering the mutually supportive environment of the Genetics Department where both world class science and education flourish side by side. Alec cares about his science, his colleagues and his students."

Professor Colin Blakemore, Chief Executive of the Medical Research Council (MRC) said:

"I am delighted that two British scientists, Professor Sir Edwin Southern and Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys, have been awarded the Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research in recognition of their work, which transformed the field of human genetic analysis.

"Both scientists have been part of the MRC 'family' of scientists for many years and this award is a powerful endorsement of their contribution to medical research.

"Edwin Southern invented the seminal 'Southern blot' technique for identifying DNA sequences in the human genome while working at the MRC Mammalian Genome Unit in Edinburgh.

"The MRC has long supported Alec Jeffreys' work at the University of Leicester through project grants. His 'eureka moment', the devising of 'genetic fingerprinting', has revolutionised forensic diagnostics."

The Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research Presented to: Edwin Southern and Alec Jeffreys

For development of two powerful technologies - Southern hybridization and DNA fingerprinting - that together revolutionized human genetics and forensic diagnostics.

The 2005 Albert Lasker Award for Clinical Medical Research honors two scientists who revolutionized human genetics and forensic diagnostics. By inventing a method for detecting specific DNA sequences amidst the huge genomes of complex organisms, Edwin Southern infused genetic analysis with tremendous power. Suddenly scientists could study genetic variation in detail and decipher gene structures. Using this technology, Alec Jeffreys devised "genetic fingerprinting," a way to distinguish every person from every other person, except an identical twin. Its ability to establish family relationships as well as individual identity has helped solve crimes, settle paternity and immigration disputes, establish the bases of inherited diseases, enhance transplantation biology, save endangered species, establish human origins and migrations, and advance countless other beneficial endeavors.

Technology has always defined the strength of genetic analysis. Until the mid 1970s, the ability to locate most genes or sequences of interest on the chromosomes of complex organisms was nearly impossible. This situation severely restricted efforts to define genetic differences that characterize species, individuals, and specific cell types, thus hampering the study of subjects as diverse as evolution and the physiological characteristics of distinct tissues.

Mini but Mighty

In the mid 1970s, scientists could group people based on proteins in the blood and other bodily fluids, but these typing schemes were inadequate. For example, the ABO blood-typing system divides humans into only four groups (A, B, AB, and O). Alec Jeffreys (at the University of Leicester) wanted to find DNA that might uniquely identify individuals-variations associated with normal differences as well as those that cause disease-and he seized on the Southern blot to aid his search. He and others showed that single basepair changes at restriction sites existed, but were insufficiently informative to act as distinctive markers.

Several research groups had noticed highly variable regions present at diverse spots in the human genome. In each case, the spans-or "minisatellites"-consisted of short repeated DNA sequences; different people carried different numbers of repeats.

When Jeffreys was analyzing the human myoglobin gene for other reasons, he found a minisatellite consisting of a 33-basepair repeat. To determine whether related sequences exist, he probed the entire genome with a piece of radioactively labeled single-stranded DNA that contained multiple copies of this sequence. It bound at several sites, four of which varied greatly from person to person, differing in length by an integral number of repeat units. The repeats differed somewhat in sequence, but all carried a common core.

Jeffreys engineered a piece of single-stranded DNA that contained multiple copies of this shared core and tagged it with radioactivity. He then used this DNA to scour the human genome for additional minisatellites, reasoning that each person's constellation of minisatellites should identify him or her because lengths vary from individual to individual. Together, they comprise a unique genetic fingerprint. Jeffreys showed that members of a family can be distinguished-and that each offspring carries only bands from the parents-half from the mother and half from the father, except in the occasional case where a new mutation crops up.

Satellites Land in the Real World Jeffreys soon applied his technique to a number of practical problems. The first such use, in 1985, involved the immigration case of a UK citizen who was returning to join his mother and siblings after a long visit to his original home of Ghana. Officials said that this boy's passport was forged and, as a consequence, he faced deportation. The authorities thought he might be a nephew or unrelated. But DNA fingerprint analysis showed that all of the boy's DNA bands matched either those of the mother or one of her undisputed children (and by inference, the father), and the family was reunited.

Jeffreys improved and adapted the technology so it would work on tiny amounts of forensic biological samples and lend itself to computer database manipulation, which facilitates DNA comparisons. In 1986, he used the related method of DNA profiling in a confounding case of two brutal rape and murder attacks in Leicestershire, UK. Eventually the police instigated the first DNA-based manhunt, asking for voluntary samples from all men of a certain age in the area's villages. After a convoluted series of events, which included a false confession, the murderer persuading a colleague to act as a proxy for the blood test, and an overheard conversation in a pub, the police tracked down the killer, who is serving a life sentence for each murder. Forensic teams worldwide now routinely use DNA profiling. It has not only convicted many criminals, but also has absolved innocent people who were wrongly accused. Furthermore, DNA is quite stable and remains relatively intact after death. As a result, scientists could take advantage of the method to name disaster victims, including those of 9/11, and Jeffreys could confirm the identity of an exhumed body thought to be the Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele.

Applications of DNA fingerprinting and related techniques are endless. In bone marrow transplants, for example, the circulating blood cells should carry donor, not recipient, DNA patterns. Scientists can ferret out DNA signatures of inherited diseases and cancers. The method has addressed problems in international smuggling, conservation biology and molecular anthropology as well. Investigators can establish, for instance, that a wildlife trophy came from the corpse of a protected animal. Furthermore, they can use it to avoid mating close relatives while trying to save an endangered population. Molecular ecologists have harnessed the strategy to figure out which individuals have spawned the most offspring. It has advanced the fields of evolutionary and population biology, enabling detailed genetic comparisons of various groups. For example, Jeffreys and others showed that the breadth of human variation in Africa was considerably greater than that in non-African populations. These observations supported the theory that people originated in Africa.

Southern invented a technology that made complex genomes accessible to meticulous analysis, and Jeffreys capitalized on this method to uncover the huge diversity of genetic variation. The effects of these innovations have been profound-reverberating over a wide range of sociological, medical, scientific, and forensic arenas.

The Awards will be presented on Friday, September 23 in New York.

For the full press release on the Lasker Awards in pdf form click HERE

For further information contact the University of Leicester Press Office Tel: +44 (0)116 252 2415, Fax: +44(0)116 252 2485, or Email: pressoffice@le.ac.uk