At 10:00 a.m. on August 16, 2024, the 2024 Future Science Awards announced this year's "Life Science Award" to Professor Deng Hongkui, a stem cell biologist at Peking University.

The prize money for the award is approximately 7.2 million yuan (equivalent to US$1 million).

Reason for the award: In recognition of his pioneering contribution to the use of chemical methods to reprogram somatic cells into pluripotent stem cells, which has changed our understanding of the fate and state of cells.

Representative research results of Professor Deng Hongkui:

In 2013, Deng Hongkui's team published a paper in the journal Science, reporting for the first time that mature somatic cells can be transformed into pluripotent stem cells (CiPS cells) using only small chemical molecules, creating a new method of regulating cell destiny.

In April 2022, the team published research in the journal Nature, demonstrating how to induce human cells to dedifferentiate and generate pluripotent stem cells through chemical small molecules, providing a new way for stem cell preparation and transformation.

In January 2023, Deng Hongkui's team introduced a new islet transplantation strategy in the journal Nature Metabolism. This method supports the survival, maturity and long-term function of islet cells differentiated from human pluripotent stem cells in vivo. Compared with traditional methods, it has the advantages of less trauma, easier operation and easier tracking.

In September 2019, Deng Hongkui's team published research in The New England Journal of Medicine, reporting a clinical trial using CRISPR gene editing technology to perform CCR5 gene editing on adult hematopoietic stem cells of patients. The long-term reconstruction of genetically edited hematopoietic stem cells in the human body provides treatment for a 27-year-old male patient suffering from AIDS and acute lymphoblastic leukemia. After treatment, the patient's leukemia was relieved, his T cells showed partial resistance to the HIV virus, and no obvious off-target effects or side effects were observed.