Stanley B. Prusiner facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Stanley B. Prusiner
Prusiner in 2024
Born	Stanley Ben Prusiner (1942-05-28) May 28, 1942 (age 83) Des Moines, Iowa, U.S.
Nationality	American
Alma mater	University of Pennsylvania (BA, MD)
Known for	Prions Transmissible spongiform encephalopathy Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease
Spouse(s)	Sandy Turk Prusiner
Children	two
Awards	Potamkin Prize (1991) Metlife Foundation Award for Medical Research in Alzheimer's Disease (1991) Dickson Prize (1993) Richard Lounsbery Award (1993) Lasker Award (1994) Keio Medical Science Prize (1996) Wolf Prize in Medicine (1996) Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1997) ForMemRS (1997) Sir Hans Krebs Medal (1999)
Scientific career
Fields	Neurology Infectious diseases
Institutions	University of California, Berkeley University of California, San Francisco

Stanley Ben Prusiner (born May 28, 1942) is an American neurologist and biochemist. He leads a research center at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF).

Prusiner is famous for discovering prions. Prions are a type of pathogen (something that causes disease) made mostly of protein. They can reproduce themselves and cause serious illnesses. When he first suggested this idea, many scientists thought it was very unusual.

In 1994, he received the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. Then, in 1997, he won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. These awards were for his important research on prion diseases. He and his team started this work in the early 1970s.

Early Life and Education

Stanley Prusiner was born on May 28, 1942, in Des Moines, Iowa. His family was Jewish. His father, Lawrence Prusiner, was an architect. Stanley grew up in Des Moines and Cincinnati, Ohio. He went to Walnut Hills High School. People there sometimes called him "the little genius." This was because of his early work on a special spray to keep Boxelder bugs away.

Prusiner studied chemistry at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned a Bachelor of Arts degree there. Later, he got his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

After medical school, Prusiner did an internship at the University of California, San Francisco. He then worked at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). There, he studied tiny organisms called E. coli.

Career and Research

After three years at NIH, Prusiner returned to UCSF. He completed a residency in neurology. In 1974, he became a professor in the neurology department at UCSF. Over the years, he has held many teaching and research positions at both UCSF and UC Berkeley.

Since 1999, Prusiner has been the director of the Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases. This research lab at UCSF studies diseases that affect the brain. His work focuses on prion diseases, Alzheimer's disease, and other brain conditions called tauopathies.

Prions: A New Idea in Science

In 1998, Prusiner wrote an article about prions. He said that the idea of prions being a protein that causes disease was very new and different.

Scientists were trying to understand a mysterious brain disease called encephalopathy. This disease makes the brain full of holes. They didn't know what caused it. Prusiner and his team suggested a new idea. They thought the disease might be caused by a "deadly type of a normal protein." This protein could make more copies of itself in the brain. They called this new type of protein a "prion" (pronounced PREE-on). This idea was surprising because most diseases are caused by things with nucleic acids, like DNA or RNA.

Awards and Honors

Stanley Prusiner received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1997. This was for his work explaining the cause of "mad cow disease" (bovine spongiform encephalopathy) and a similar human disease called Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease.

In 1982, he created the word prion. It comes from "proteinaceous" (meaning made of protein) and "infectious" (meaning it can spread). He used this word to describe a new kind of infection. This infection happens when proteins fold into the wrong shape.

Prusiner was chosen to be a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1992. He also became a member of many other important scientific groups. These include the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1993) and the Royal Society (1997).

See also

• Frank Bastian
• Daniel Carleton Gajdusek
• Laura Manuelidis
• List of Jewish Nobel laureates