Mary E. Brunkow
Facts
© Nobel Prize Outreach. Photo: Clément Morin
Mary E. Brunkow
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2025
Born: 23 April 1961, Portland, OR, USA
Affiliation at the time of the award: Institute for Systems Biology, Seattle, WA, USA
Prize motivation: “for their discoveries concerning peripheral immune tolerance”
Prize share: 1/3
Work
The body’s powerful immune system must be regulated, or it may attack our own organs. In 1995, Shimon Sakaguchi discovered a class of immune cells, regulatory T cells, which protect the body from autoimmune diseases. Following Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell’s discovery, six years later, that mutations in a gene cause autoimmune diseases, Sakaguchi was able to show that the gene controls the development of the cells he had identified. The discoveries can help the development of medical treatments for cancer and autoimmune diseases and lead to more successful transplantations.
Women who changed science
A chance discovery made around 80 years ago paved the way for Mary Brunkow’s painstaking work, which contributed to redefining how the immune system functions. Read more about the 2025 medicine laureate and how she has embraced the unexpected throughout her career.
Mary Brunkow showing the slides for her thesis defense, 1990.
Credit: Mary Brunkow
Nobel Prizes and laureates
Six prizes were awarded for achievements that have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind. The 14 laureates' work and discoveries range from quantum tunnelling to promoting democratic rights.
See them all presented here.
