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Avoiding the Discussion of "Phase Separation" - Research on the "Low Complexity Structural Domain" of Italian Proteins in the Lasker Award
02 Mar,2026
On September 11, 2025, the 2025 Lasker Medical Award, a bellwether of the Nobel Prize, was announced. The highly anticipated Lasker Basic Medical Research Award was presented to Dirk Görlich from the Max Planck Institute in Germany and Steven L. McKnight from the UT Southwestern Medical Center in the United States, in recognition of their pioneering research on the structure and function of "low-complexity domains" (LCRs). This research has revealed the role of these protein sequences in intracellular trafficking, cellular tissue structure, and pathological processes such as neurodegenerative diseases. It is reported that the Lasker Award ceremony will be held in New York, USA, on September 19, 2025.
"Low-complexity domains" (LCRs) may be unfamiliar to some, but if one mentions the booming research on phase separation in the past five years, few industry insiders would remain unheard of. So, the question arises: why was the LCR, rather than phase separation, awarded the Lasker Award this time? It should be noted that the 2023 Breakthrough Prizes (with a single award of $3 million) were awarded to two other scientists: Anthony Hyman from the Max Planck Institute in Germany (right in the picture below) and Clifford Brangwynne from Princeton University (left in the picture below). They were honored for discovering a fundamental mechanism in cellular organization: the formation of membraneless droplets through phase separation of proteins and RNA, which enables spatial regulation of cellular functions
Then the question arises. The author has long believed that the Nobel Prize will eventually be awarded to this field. However, as the Nobel Prize can only be awarded to a maximum of three individuals, how will the award be distributed (and the Max Planck Institute in Germany cannot escape it)? Perhaps in three weeks, the Nobel Committee will indulge in its whim and award the prize earlier than expected.
Let's not argue about who it was sent to, but focus on the matter at hand. This Lasker Award clearly deliberately avoids discussing phase separation and focuses on the low-complexity disordered sequences of proteins, actually delving into the essence of protein function research. Dirk Görlich and Steven L. McKnight, in their independent research, have both discovered that low-complexity disordered domains of proteins mediate protein aggregation (currently commonly referred to as protein "phase separation").
Dirk Görlich has long focused on the research of nuclear pore complexes (NPCs). It is worth mentioning that the "Life Science or Medicine Award" of the World Laureates Association, with a prize money of up to 10 million yuan, was awarded to Dirk Görlich in 2022 for his "key discoveries on the mechanism and selectivity of protein transport between the cytoplasm and the nucleus" (this award is still too little known, despite the considerable prize money. If it weren't for the fact that I had to search for information online to learn about his Lasker Award, I wouldn't have any impression of him at all. On the other hand, it proves that the Top Science Award has its own vision and doesn't just add to the accolades of the winners after they have won other major awards).
In summary, the research conducted by McKnight and Görlich has revolutionized our understanding of the nature of the 15-20% of proteins in the proteome that contain LCDs: these structural domains enable cells to create flexible, reversible structures that do not rely on traditional membrane-bound organelles, but can also organize and regulate functions. In this sense, their awarding of the Lasker Basic Medical Research Award is undisputed, indicating that the review committee judges how to award prizes in the field more from the underlying logic of protein characteristics.
02 Mar,2026
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