Discovery
Endothelium-derived relaxing factor was originally the name given to several proposed factors causing vasodilation. The major endothelial derived relaxing factor was later discovered to be nitric oxide (NO).
The discovery of the biological functions of nitric oxide in the 1980s came as a complete surprise and caused quite a stir. Nitric oxide was named "Molecule of the Year" in 1992 by the journal Science, a Nitric Oxide Society was founded, and a scientific journal devoted entirely to nitric oxide was established. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1998 was awarded to Ferid Murad, Robert F. Furchgott, and Louis Ignarro for the discovery of the signalling properties of nitric oxide. Salvador Moncada also identified EDRF as NO molecule, but did not share the Nobel Prize primarily due to the Nobel policy of honoring only three discoverers. It is estimated that yearly approximately 3,000 scientific articles are published on the biological roles of nitric oxide.
Read more about this topic: Biological Functions Of Nitric Oxide
Famous quotes containing the word discovery:
“We are all humiliated by the sudden discovery of a fact which has existed very comfortably and perhaps been staring at us in private while we have been making up our world entirely without it.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“The discovery of the North Pole is one of those realities which could not be avoided. It is the wages which human perseverance pays itself when it thinks that something is taking too long. The world needed a discoverer of the North Pole, and in all areas of social activity, merit was less important here than opportunity.”
—Karl Kraus (1874–1936)
“I have known no experience more distressing than the discovery that Negroes didn’t love me. Unutterable loneliness claimed me. I felt without roots, like a man without a country ...”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 10 (1962)