2024-10-15 17:30:00
He was born in Bahía Blanca in 1927. His mother was a teacher and his father was a Russian immigrant engaged in commerce. Cesare was the middle brother of three boys. His vocation for medicine awoke at the age of ten, when his mother gave him the book “The Microbe Hunters” by Paul de Kruif. Scientific work meant a real adventure story for Milstein.
He was also marked by a visit to the Malbrán Institute where an older cousin worked. César asked her to meet him after she told him about the snake venom experiments being carried out there. He studied at UBA where he majored in chemistry and then earned his doctorate. He immediately began working in Dr. Andrés Stoppani’s research group.
Shortly thereafter, he obtained a scholarship to study at Cambridge under the guidance of Fred Sanger. Upon his return to Argentina he held the position of head of molecular biology at the Malbrán Institute, a position from which he resigned after the overthrow of Arturo Frondizi and the organization’s subsequent intervention during the presidency of José María Guido. After his resignation, he sent a letter to the two-time Nobel Prize winner, the biochemist Frederick Sanger, who proposed that he dedicate himself to the study of antibodies.
In 1975, César Milstein, together with the German George Kohler, published research in the journal “Science” in which they revealed monoclonal antibodies, a revolutionary discovery for science. It involves the laboratory production of proteins capable of attacking invasive substances present in the patient to specifically target a type of cell. Its field of application is very broad and ranges, among others, to the fight against cancer, the preparation of pregnancy tests and the production of vaccines.
Although this would have made him enormously wealthy, Milstein did not register any patents for his discovery, as he believed that intellectual property belonged to all humanity. In addition to the Nobel Prize, he also received the Wolf Prize for Medicine in 1980 and the Konex de Brillante in 1993.
He died on March 24, 2002 in Cambridge, England, at the age of 74.
On October 15, 1984, the Argentine scientist César Milstein won the Nobel Prize for Medicine. The story also makes news on Radio Perfil.
Voiceover Pita Fortin
Screenplay by Javier Pasaragua
Video Ezequiel Montagna
from Profilo Radio
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