Brown and Goldstein

Discovering the molecular basis of disease: The work of Brown and Goldstein

Michael S. Brown and Joseph L. Goldstein pioneered an approach for turning genetic information into molecular understanding—an approach now commonly used by other researchers including Christine Seidman and Richard Lifton. The approach involves finding an inherited form of a disease and studying the affected families' DNA in order to map and isolate the disease-causing forms of the genes. The knowledge gained from one family can have implications that may extend to members of the general population suffering from related but not identical health problems.

A Nobel prize for cholesterol discoveries

Brown and Goldstein were awarded the Nobel prize in 1985 for their discovery of the LDL-cholesterol receptor and its role in the control of cholesterol metabolism. Much of our current understanding of the impact of cholesterol on cardiovascular disease follows from their work.