光遗传学摘得诺贝尔生理学或医学奖

Three scientists who developed a way to precisely switch brain cells on and off with light have been honored with this year’s Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. The method, known as optogenetics, has clarified nerve circuits in healthy and diseased brains. It has also been adapted to help a few blind people regain modest sensitivity to light and is being tested as a treatment for epilepsy, pain, and more. Peter Hegemann of the Humboldt University of Berlin and Georg Nagel of the Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg paved the way for the technique. In the 2000s, the pair discovered that a protein in the single-celled alga Chlamydomonas responds to light. …