Montagnier, Barre-Sinoussi and zur Hausen Share Nobel
Wednesday, October 8, 2008 - 21:01
in Health & Medicine
A pair of French scientists who isolated the AIDS-causing human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and a German scientist who determined that human papillomavirus (HPV) causes cervical cancer were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine today. The Nobel committee's decision to give the prize to Luc Montagnier and Francoise Barre-Sinoussi, who isolated HIV in 1983, caps a long, bitter dispute between the Pasteur Institute in Paris, where they made their discovery, and American scientist Robert Gallo, who linked HIV to AIDS separately but was snubbed by the Nobel committee. [More]