Congratulations to the winners of the annual Ming K Jeang Award for Excellence in Cell & Bioscience for 2013. The winning papers (below), have been chosen for their innovation, high-quality execution and lasting contribution to the biosciences. The winners are chosen by a committee of internationally renowned Cell & Bioscience Editors, chaired by Dr Chris Lau.

Monoubiquitination of EEA1 regulates endosome fusion and trafficking

Harish N Ramanathan, Guofeng Zhang, Yihong Ye

Cell & Bioscience 2013, 3:24 (23 May 2013)

Dr TC Wu, a judge on the selection panel for the award, has commented on the importance of this research:

“Early endosomal autoantigen 1 (EEA1) is an essential component of the endosomal fusion machinery. The current study demonstrates that EEA1 is subject to regulation in cells by ubiquitination, which appears to control not only the size of the endosomes, but also their trafficking pattern. The understanding of the molecular mechanisms may serve as an important foundation for altering the trafficking of endosomes through manipulation of the ubiquitination pathway.”

Autophagy lessens ischemic liver injury by reducing oxidative damage

Kai Sun, Xuqin Xie, Yan Liu, Zhipeng Han, Xue Zhao, Ning Cai, Shanshan Zhang, Jianrui Song, Lixin Wei

Cell & Bioscience 2013, 3:26 (10 June 2013)

Dr Yun-Bo Shi, Editor-in-Chief of Cell & Bioscience notes why this research has been chosen to win the award:

“Ischemia-reperfusion  injury is a common complication during liver surgery and transplantation. Although nearly all the studies about ischemia-reperfusion focus on reperfusion, long time ischemia is also a crucial damage factor in liver injury. This study demonstrates that autophagy can be sufficiently induced by ischemia and plays a protective role during the hepatic ischemic period. Autophagy reduces generation of reactive oxygen species and subsequent necrosis via elimination of mitochondria by mitophagy in the ischemic process. These results suggest a potential therapeutic strategy using pre-treatment in liver surgery.”

Congratulations to the authors of the winning articles! We look forward receiving further outstanding research contributions this year and beyond. You can read more about the Cell & Bioscience Research award in an editorial published today, and also in our coverage in Biome.