December 11, 1998

Ferid Murad, MD, used to walk the halls of the MGH when he was a medical resident from 1965 to 1967. On Dec. 8, he shook the hand of the king of Sweden and received the Nobel prize in Medicine for his work with nitric oxide (NO) as a signaling molecule.

Murad, now at the University of Texas Medical School in Houston, received the award from the Nobel Assembly along with colleagues Robert Furchgott, PhD, and Louis Ignarro, PhD.

NO is a gas that transmits important signals for an organism. The discovery that a gas produced by one cell could penetrate through membranes and regulate the function of another cell represented a new principle for signaling in biological systems.

NO has proven to be a crucial molecule to the cardiovascular and nervous systems as well as for fighting against infections, regulating blood pressure and serving as a gatekeeper for the flow of blood to different organs. Research at the MGH by Jesse D. Roberts, MD, of the Anesthesia and Critical Care and Pediatrics departments, and elsewhere has shown that the inhalation of small amounts of NO can be effective in treating patients with certain lung ailments, particularly infants who have dangerously high blood pressure in their lungs.

Warren Zapol, MD, MGH Anesthetist-in-Chief, attended part of the week-long Nobel prize celebration to moderate a symposium about the clinical use of inhaled nitric oxide, which may be seen on the Internet at www.aga.se. Zapol and Claes Frostell, MD, PhD, of Astrid Lindgren Children's Hospital in Sweden, were pioneers of inhaled NO (iNO) and were advised by Nobel prize winner Ignarro in studying the use of iNO in the treatment of persistent pulmonary hypertension in newborn infants.

"There is no doubt that the decision to award the Nobel prize to the discoverers of NO as a signal molecule will raise the level of people's awareness of inhaled NO," says Zapol. "I believe that NO has plenty of positive therapeutic surprises in store for the medical community and for our patients in the years to come."