Rodney R. Porter

Facts

Rodney R. Porter

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Rodney R. Porter
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1972

Born: 8 October 1917, Newton-le-Willows, United Kingdom

Died: 6 September 1985, Winchester, United Kingdom

Affiliation at the time of the award: University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom

Prize motivation: “for their discoveries concerning the chemical structure of antibodies”

Prize share: 1/2

Work

Our immune system protects us from attacks by microorganism and poisons, in part through formation of antibodies in the blood that neutralize foreign substances. Rodney Porter and Gerald Edelmann separately researched the chemical composition of antibodies. Using various chemical methods, they split up antibodies into smaller parts and mapped their biological effects. In 1959, this allowed them to determine the structure of antibodies. Antibodies are made up of two smaller and two larger polypeptide chains that form a Y-shaped structure.

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