Nobel Prize in medicine awarded for discovery of how cells sense oxygen washingtonpost.com

Three physician-scientists from the U.S. and Britain will share the prize.

BALTIMORE — The Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine was awarded Monday to three physician-scientists from the United States and Britain — William G. Kaelin Jr., Peter J. Ratcliffe, and Gregg L. Semenza — “for their discoveries of how cells sense and adapt to oxygen availability.”

The discoveries by the trio illuminated what the Nobel Committee called “one of life’s most essential adaptive processes,” answering profound questions about how the body works and providing potential new therapeutic avenues to treat cancer and other diseases.