Wittgenstein Award Laureate
Wittgenstein Award Laureate 1999 Univ. Prof. Dr. Kim Ashley Nasmyth
Yeast Cell Cycle, The Research Institute of Molecular Pathology (IMP)
STICKING AND SEPARATION OF CELL NUCLEI
The microbiologist Kim Nasmyth can summarize his entire discipline in a single fundamental sentence. ”It’s all about how cells reproduce and multiply.” Born in England, Nasmyth has been working since 1988 at the Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna, concentrating on how this complex issue is solved. He is focussing on yeast cells as the processes of cell division can be examined very easily in this organism.
The mechanisms that ensure that daughter cells receive identical sets of chromosomes are being observed with increasing accuracy. Among the questions that have been occupying molecular biologists since over 100 years ago are those relating to the ”molecular glue” that holds chromatids together and to the mechanism of separation. The answers are equally relevant to basic research and to applications in various fields. ”A neurobiologist interested in, let’s say, the molecular basis of consciousness – if there is one, and I am convinced that there is – will sooner or later have to look at the common chemistry, the logistics of the proteins. And cell division is one of the fundamental processes that are involved.”
Nasmyth is Director of the IMP, a private institute run by Boehringer-Ingelheim that cooperates with the Vienna University via the Vienna BioCenter. In this position the yeast geneticist frequently has to make statements on the sensitive issue of gene research. ”I think it would be a backwards move to be opposed to gene manipulation per se. It would be like Prince Charles saying that we should build houses like in the 18th century. It just isn’t possible; civilization would die off. We are moving, changing, testing new things. Staying the same is simply not a clever way to survive. We don’t know what works until we try it out.”
The key question is how research can best be applied for changing society. The Americans seem to have solved this problem best, according to Nasmyth. There is a higher concentration of research and money in Boston and its surroundings than elsewhere. ”Perhaps this stems from the Americans’ wish to live for ever. Apart from that, they believe that you hold your own fate in your hands. These two points together mean that unbelievable amounts of public and private money flow into biomedical research.”
In 1999 Nasmyth was awarded the Wittgenstein Prize, becoming after Erwin Friedrich Wagner the second recipient of the Prize at the IMP. With the award he has been able to concentrate on the ”glues” described above and to work on mechanisms of division. The team has managed within the first year ”to identify some key proteins, which are responsible for holding together duplicated chromosomes before the real cell division and the separating from each other at the correct time.”
The Prize money should be used to extend and intensify the ongoing projects. To be precise, it should finance work to identify the molecular structure of the newly identified proteins. ”In addition we should like to use the extra financial, and thus personnel, resources to resolve the function of similar proteins in animals.”
