The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has named Marine Biological Laboratory scientist Osamu Shimomura co-winner of this year’s Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery and development of the green fluorescent protein, GFP.. The brightly glowing green fluorescent protein, GFP, was first observed in the beautiful jellyfish Aequorea victoria in 1962. Since then, this protein has become one of the most important tools used in contemporary bioscience. With the aid of GFP, researchers have developed ways to watch processes that were previously invisible, such as the development of nerve cells in the brain or how cancer cells spread. Shimomura first isolated GFP from the jellyfish Aequorea victoria, which drifts with the currents off the west coast of North America. He discovered that this protein glowed bright green under ultraviolet light. The initial discovery of GFP and a series of important developments have led to its use as a tagging tool in bioscience. By using DNA technology, researchers can now connect GFP to other interesting, but otherwise invisible, proteins. This glowing marker allows them to watch the movements, positions and interactions of the tagged proteins. Researchers can also follow the fate of various cells with the help of GFP: nerve cell damage during Alzheimer’s disease or how insulin-producing beta cells are created in the pancreas of a growing embryo. In one spectacular experiment, researchers succeeded in ...
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