Mary E. Brunkow’s speech at the Nobel Prize banquet, 10 December 2025

Your Majesties,
Your Royal Highnesses,
Excellences,
Dear Laureates,
Ladies and gentlemen,

On behalf of Professors Shimon Sakaguchi and Fred Ramsdell, I would like to thank the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institute and the Nobel Foundation. 

On October 6, while I was desperately trying to sleep through the 1:00am scam calls from Sweden, and Fred, high in the backcountry of Wyoming, was blissfully unaware of the worldwide excitement that was brewing, Shimon had the good sense to live in a time zone with more working hours that overlap those in Sweden – and he took that call in a timely fashion!  We are deeply honored by this recognition of our discovery of the key driver of peripheral immune tolerance, which is required to maintain immune homeostasis.

My own career has taken various twists and turns since the small biotech company where Fred and I worked together closed its doors in early 2004. In the intervening years I have witnessed how, together with Shimon’s foundational work in the field, our discovery of the FOXP3 gene and its essential role in driving the development of regulatory T cells set in motion astonishing advances in our understanding of how the immune system both protects against foreign invaders and does NOT recognize and attack our own organs and tissues. 

The past 20 years has seen remarkably innovative approaches to harnessing the power of the rare but mighty regulatory T cell. Today numerous clinical trials based on Treg cell activity are in various stages of progress to treat many of our most common and burdensome conditions, and the future for effective treatments and potentially cures, is now bright and hopeful. 

Our story is typical, on the one hand, as one whose success depended on and expanded upon basic research advances over many decades. When Peter Medawar accepted the Nobel Prize in 1960 for first describing immune tolerance he said: if we today see further than our predecessors, it is only because we stand on their shoulders; and somewhat atypical in that the contributions from Fred and me came out of a small biotech operation. Although we were unable to pursue Treg cell biology ourselves within that same environment, we were able to publish our results, which were taken up by the scientific community in a way that I find both gratifying and humbling. Of course Shimon’s work that is being recognized was both preceded and followed by many other invaluable studies in the field. I want to highlight the powerful synergies between research efforts in academic labs and in the private sector. Each realm has its own unique strengths and the most significant advances in clinical applications come out of capitalizing and expanding upon those synergies. 

Shimon, Fred and I gratefully acknowledge the many many research team members, collaborators, mentors, and funders who have supported us throughout our careers.  We also couldn’t do what we did without the support of family and other colleagues. As a woman in science I especially want to acknowledge those role models who gave me the courage and incentive to persevere; my hope is that I in turn can be that role model for my own daughters, who are just now launching out into the world, as well as for other young women who are excited about science.

Thank you.