Elizabeth Blackburn, Carol Greider and Jack Szoztak get the Nobel Prize for Medicine

Americans Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol and Jack W. Creider Szoztak are the winners of Nobel Prize for Medicine 2009 for his discoveries of how the enzyme telomerase protects the chromosomes, reported today the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

The medicine prize is endowed with ten million kronor (980,000 euros or $ 1.4 million) and, like the other Nobel prizes, is delivered on December 10, the anniversary of the death of its founder, Alfred Nobel.

A discovery to tackle cancer
The three Americans discovered that there is a protective ring around the chromosomes created by so-called telomeres and telomerase, which make the fountain of youth functions of cells-for the good of the 'good' and bad of the 'bad "like cancer.

Blackburn, born in 1948 in Tasmania and Australian-based dual citizenship, and Greider, born in 1961 in San Diego, discovered the enzyme telomerase together in 1985 when the first ran the doctorate of his young colleague. This research followed the line a year earlier proposal by the very Blackburn and Szostak, born in London in 1952 and formed between the U.S. and Canada.

The Karolinska Institute awards and a trio of researchers connected with the cell and cancer studies, trained at prestigious institutions of Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada and the U.S..

Biographies of the winners
Blackburn grew up in Tasmania and educated at Melbourne University in 1975 his Ph.D. at Cambridge (UK) and pursued his postdoctoral research at Yale (USA). From there he went to practice at the University of California at Berkeley, and since 1990 a professor of biology and physiology at the University of California San Francisco.

Greider, born in America, was formed between the University of California, Santa Barbara and Berkeley, where he received his doctorate in 1987, led by Blackburn. Subsequently investigated in the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and currently serves as professor of molecular biology and genetics at the University of Baltimore.

Szostak, finally, was born in 1952 in London and was formed between the U.S. and Canada, until his doctorate at Cornell University in New York. He is professor of genetics at Massachusetts General Hospital, an activity he combines with his scientific work at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.