Well, previously I have written about how I thought that there should have been a Nobel Prize awarded to Carl Woese and Norm Pace for pioneering work on microbial diversity. See for example “Some arguments for why Carl Woese (and probably Norm Pace) deserves a Nobel Prize“. Alas Carl Woese passed away recently and is no longer eligible. However, in a way this opens up things to a perhaps more medical driven Nobel prize in Medicine for the microbiome. I believe that the human microbiome has been shown to be important enough in medicine to be deserving of a Nobel Prize in medicine.
And if that is true, then we can ask “Are there any people who would deserve a prize in this area?” And the answer is pretty clearly yes. I would suggest that there are two people who deserve such a recognition: Norm Pace and Jeff Gordon. Norm Pace for his pioneering work on characterizing microbes indirectly via sequencing their RNA and DNA, especially their ribosomal RNA genes. And Jeffrey Gordon for his pioneering work on animal and the human micro biome and in showing that the microbiome plays fundamental roles in animals and human health and phenotypes.
I will write more about this later but just wanted to get this thought out there … and see what people think.
UPDATE September 2015 I note. I have been and continue to be concerned with the spread of “microbiomania” which is the term I use to refer to “Overselling the Microbiome“. Even though this still is a problem, I also believe the microbiome has now been clearly shown to be critically important to human health in diverse ways and I do think it is appropriate to award a Nobel Prize in this area.
Also note Reuters is reporting that Jeffrey Gordon is on their candidate list this year (based on ISI predictions).
Jonathan Eisen's Lab 