Stanley Prusiner

Stanley Prusiner is a scientist who discovered prions—misfolded proteins that can cause certain brain diseases. Unlike bacteria or viruses, prions are just proteins that have changed shape in a way that makes them harmful, leading to conditions like mad cow disease and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. His work showed that these infectious proteins can replicate by transferring their abnormal shape to normal proteins, challenging previous ideas about infectious agents. In 1997, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for this groundbreaking discovery, fundamentally changing our understanding of infectious diseases and protein biology.