Nobel Assembly Deals with Scandal’ (Nature 537, 289–290; 2016) Erroneously Gave Stockholm As the Location for All of the Nobel Prize Ceremonies

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the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington DC. The advisory panel’s recommendations should provide the information that lawmakers want, says Jon Retzlaff, managing director of science policy and government affairs for the American Association for Cancer Research in Washington DC. Retzlaff plans to start lobbying Congress with the recommendations in hand.

ALEXANDER MAHMOUD/NOBEL MEDIA AB “The concepts and the grant proposals that will be generated because of these proposals, I think, will inspire Congress to say, ‘Yes, this is a worthy project,’” he says. For now, uncertainty hangs heavy over moonshot-related discussions. At a meeting on 7 September, NCI deputy director Dinah Singer said that the agency aims to launch some moonshot programmes in fiscal year 2017 and might seek extra funding from the private sector. But some NCI advisers are concerned that without substantial new government cash, implementing the advisory- panel recommendations could hamper the The medicine prize is awarded at a prestigious ceremony in Stockholm. NCI’s current projects. Agency director Douglas Lowy is hoping for ETHICS a big budget boost from the government. “If we didn’t get one, it’s not that we wouldn’t be able to start anything,” he said. “It’s just that the size, scope and speed would be dramatically Nobel Assembly different.” Despite the uncertainty, the report generated excitement among some cancer deals with scandal researchers. A call to expand the use of proven cancer-prevention and early-detection strat- egies was a pleasant surprise, says cancer Prize-selection panel rocked by investigations into geneticist Bert Vogelstein of Johns Hopkins surgeon — but its credibility stays intact. University in Baltimore, Maryland. Although many specialists think that the approach could slash cancer deaths, it has not typically been BY ALISON ABBOTT Swedish public prosecutors opened investi- high on the funding list, he says. “I was very gations following preliminary charges against impressed. They picked out some under n an unprecedented move, the group that Macchiarini of involuntary manslaughter and explored opportunities.” selects the winners of the Nobel Prize in causing grievous bodily harm. Macchiarini But at the 7 September meeting, several Physiology or Medicine — the Nobel has denied the allegations. attendees argued that the report should have IAssembly — has asked two of its members On 5 September, an independent report emphasized the need for research on dispari- to resign following a scandal at the institute that revealed institutional problems at the KI ties in cancer deaths that have been linked to that supplies the assembly’s members. mentioned Nobel Assembly members Harriet race and economic status. “People are dying But scientists around the world don’t see Wallberg-Henriksson and Anders Hamsten who shouldn’t be dying,” said Mack Roach, the events at the Karolinska Institute (KI) in — both former KI vice-chancellors — for a radiation oncologist at the University of Stockholm as a threat to the reputation of their roles in hiring Macchiarini in 2010 and California, San Francisco. the medical prize. They say that the assem- subsequently extending his contracts. (Ham- That issue was largely left to the Moonshot bly is sufficiently separate to the KI and has sten resigned as vice-chancellor in February Task Force, a separate advisory panel that is handled the affair well so far. after acknowledging that he had misjudged focused on improving access to cancer care “Everything is exploding now, but the Macchiarini; the KI dismissed Macchiarini and removing barriers to cancer research, long-term credibility won’t be affected,” in March.) said its leader, Greg Simon, chief executive of says cancer researcher Julio Celis, associate The call for Wallberg-Henriksson and Poliwogg, a health-care investment company scientific director of the Danish Cancer Hamsten to resign came a day after the report in New York City. The task force plans to Society Research Center in Copenhagen. and is a first for the 115-year-old panel, says release its report later this year. The scandal involves the surgeon Paolo neuroscientist Thomas Perlmann, secretary The advisory panel’s recommendations Macchiarini. Multiple inquiries have alleged of the Nobel Committee, whose fixed-term could not cover the gamut of cancer research, that he committed scientific misconduct and members are elected from the more perma- but the breadth of its recommendations was still subjected patients to unethical, experimental nent assembly. impressive, says Stephen Elledge, a geneticist at tracheal transplant operations, three of which “The professionalism of some of the fac- Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachu- occurred at the affiliated Karolinska Univer- ulty at the Karolinska Institute has been called setts. “They did a pretty good job,” he says. “I sity Hospital. Two of the patients have since into question, and this won’t go away,” says was glad they didn’t just say, ‘Oh we just need to died, and the third has required continuous Erwin Neher of the Max Planck Institute sequence more tumours’.” ■ hospital care since the transplant. In June, for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen,

Germany, who won the medicine prize stepped down because he anticipated that he Nobel Assembly seems to be doing this.” in 1991. “But I don’t think this discredits the would be involved in the investigation.) He adds: “There is no benefit to the world, Nobel prize — they are two different things.” Two other assembly members — clini- or to patients who have been harmed, by using When Alfred Nobel died in 1896, he left the cal immunologist Katarina Le Blanc, who a very serious incident to undercut a globally bulk of his fortune — amassed from his explo- co-authored a paper with Macchiarini that important institute.” sives businesses — to the Nobel prizes. His will is under investigation by the Central Ethical The assembly has survived other challenges, specified which institutions would select each Review Board, and Hans-Gustaf Ljunggren, usually relating to complaints about its choices. prize, and declared the KI in charge of medi- who was dean of research at the KI from 2013 In 1994, it encountered accusations — quickly cine. The first prizes were awarded in 1901. until February — have not been asked to resign discredited — that it had allowed a drug com- At first, the entire KI faculty selected the because there is still “uncertainty over their pany to buy the 1986 medicine prize for Italian medicine winners, but by the 1970s it had grown roles” in the Macchiarini affair, says Perlmann. neuroscientist Rita Levi-Montalcini. too large for this to be practical — and a new “To protect the brand”, he adds, none of the Just as the Swedish king never comments on law made all documents at state institutions three, nor Wallberg-Henriksson, nor Ham- politics, the Nobel Assembly never comments accessible to the public, ruling out secret delib- sten, has participated in assembly activities on such complaints. But during its 100th anni- erations. So in 1977, the Nobel Assembly was since February. Perlmann says that the Nobel versary celebrations, it acknowledged some created, comprising 50 KI professors; the Nobel Committee is not taking further action, but regrets — such as awarding a share of the Foundation pays for its operations. will monitor perceptions of the prize to see 1923 prize for the discovery of insulin to John The Nobel Committee has also done a good whether it needs to do more. Macleod, whose role is now questioned, and the job of separating itself from the Macchiarini “It is important that institutions deal in a failure to recognize Oswald Avery, who identi- affair since it began, says neuroscientist Eero fair way with those whose judgement or moral fied DNA as the genetic material in the 1940s. Castrén at the University of Helsinki. KI genet- probity has been called into question,” says “The prize has survived many things,” says icist Urban Lendahl, who participated in the Steven Hyman, director of the Stanley Center cell biologist Måns Ehrenberg of Uppsala Uni- decision to hire Macchiarini, resigned his posi- for Psychiatric Research at the Broad Institute versity, who has served on the committee that tion as secretary-general of the Nobel Com- in Boston, Massachusetts, who has nominated selects the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. “The mittee in February, notes Castrén. (Lendahl prize candidates to the Nobel Committee. “The standard of evaluation no one can criticize.” ■

BIOLOGY (Ursus arctos) is from the polar bear (Ursus maritimus). The researchers suggest replacing the current species name, Giraffa camelopardalis, DNA reveals four with four new ones: the southern giraffe (G. giraffa), found throughout South Africa, Namibia and Botswana; the Masai giraffe (G. tippelskirchi) of giraffe species Tanzania, Kenya and Zam- bia; the reticulated giraffe (G. reticulata) found in

Finding could guide efforts to conserve the Kenya, Somalia and south- JOEL SARTORE/NGC/GETTY iconic animals. ern Ethiopia; and the northern giraffe (G. camelopardalis), found scattered through central and eastern BY CHRIS WOOLSTON chances to interbreed in the wild, Africa. The one remaining subspecies if they were so inclined. “The is the Nubian giraffe (G. camelopardalis ne of the most iconic African animals million-dollar question is what camelopardalis) of Ethiopia and South Sudan. has a secret. A genetic analysis kept them apart in the past.” Janke “This study is pretty persuasive,” says George suggests that the giraffe is not one speculates that rivers or other Amato, a conservation biologist at the Ameri- Ospecies, but four — a finding that could alter physical barriers kept popula- can Museum of Natural History in New York how conservationists protect the animals. tions separate long enough for City, who has conducted extensive research on Researchers previously split giraffes into new species to arise. the genetics of African wildlife. “I applaud the several subspecies on the basis of their coat science and what it adds to our understanding patterns and where they lived. Closer inspec- RUMINATING ON RUMINANTS of African biogeography.” tion of their genes, however, reveals that The study tracked the distribu- Janke says that the findings have implica- giraffes should actually be divided into four tion of 7 specific gene sequences tions for conservation: all of the giraffe spe- distinct lineages that don’t interbreed in the — chosen to measure genetic cies must be protected, with special attention wild, scientists reported on 8 September diversity — in nuclear DNA paid to the northern and reticulated giraffes. in Current Biology1. Previous genetic stud- from skin biopsies of 190 Each of those species has fewer than 10,000 ies2 have found discrete giraffe populations giraffes. It also analysed the ani- individuals. The overall number of giraffes that rarely intermingled, but this is the first mals’ mitochondrial DNA. The has dropped from more than 140,000 in the to detect species-level differences, says lead sequences fell into four distinct late 1990s to fewer than 80,000 today, largely author Axel Janke, a geneticist at Goethe patterns that strongly sug- because of habitat loss and hunting, according University in Frankfurt, Germany. gested separate species. Janke to the Giraffe Conservation Foundation. “It was an amazing finding,” he says. He says that the four species are notes that giraffes are highly mobile, wide- about as different from each A reticulated giraffe at the Gladys Porter Zoo in ranging animals that would have many other as the brown bear Brownsville, Texas.

CORRECTION The News story ‘Nobel Assembly deals with scandal’ (Nature 537, 289–290; 2016) erroneously gave Stockholm as the location for all of the Nobel prize ceremonies.

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