(Hypertension. 1999;34:161.)
© 1999 American Heart Association, Inc.
Editorial |
Council Honorees and the Nobel Prize
Our Continued Anniversary Celebration
1 Editor-in-Chief
2 Associate Editors
 |
Introduction |
|---|
This month we continue to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of Hypertension by honoring two more highly respected investigators who played important roles on the Council for High Blood Pressure Research (CHBPR). Again, each of the individuals that we honor was selected as a recipient of the Stouffer–Ciba–Novartis Award or was a speaker invited to present the Corcoran or other important Special Lectures. Sometime thereafter this recognition by the Council, which acknowledged their seminal scientific achievements, was honored further by selection to receive the Nobel Prize in Medicine.
In this issue, we pay tribute to Drs Michael S. Brown and Joseph L. Goldstein of the University of Texas Health Science Center in Dallas. Dr Brown, Director of the Department of Genetic Diseases, and Dr Goldstein, Chief of Molecular Genetics, jointly presented the Council for High Blood Pressure Research's Arthur C. Corcoran Memorial Lecture in 1983. Five years later, in 1988, the Nobel Prize Committee selected them for their landmark discoveries in their long-standing collaborative studies on cholesterol metabolism. In 1972, Drs Brown and Goldstein began their concerted studies on the genetic factors that are responsible for hypercholesterolemia. As a result of their work, the role of the LDL cell surface receptor in the regulation of cholesterol metabolism became understood and the genetic basis of familial hypercholesterolemia defined. Moreover, this work facilitated studies on other forms of hypercholesterolemia and led to our current understanding of these disorders and their treatment.