Luc Montagnier virologist





 Luc Montagnier is a French virologist and joint recipient, with Françoise Barré-Sinoussi and Harald zur Hausen, of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus. Wikipedia

Born: August 18, 1932 (age 88 years), Chabris, France
Spouse: Dorothea Ackerman (m. 1961)
Education: University of Paris
Field: Virology
Awards: Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine,

Work

Retroviruses are viruses whose genomes consist of RNA and whose genes can be incorporated into host cells' DNA. In 1983, Luc Montaigner and Françoise Barré-Sinoussi discovered a retrovirus in patients with swollen lymph glands that attacked lymphocytes - a kind of blood cell that is very important to the body's immune system. The retrovirus, later named Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), proved to be the cause of the immunodeficiency disease AIDS. This discovery has been crucial in radically improving treatment methods for AIDS sufferers.








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Luc Montagnier Biographical

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I was born on August 18, 1932 in Chabris, a “bourg”, larger than a village but smaller than a town, located in Berry south of the Loire Valley. This was – and still is – a region of agriculture with some renowned products such as welsh rabbit, goat cheeses and white asparagus. It was the place where my mother had grown up but, in fact, I never lived there. On my father’s side, his parents came from Auvergne, a province in the centre of France, made of rich plains and old volcanoes, the latter probably being at the origin of my family name: Montagnier, the man living in mountains. In his youth, my father had caught a terrible disease: streptococcal arthritis, ending in irreversible lesions in the aortic valves. He was therefore declared unfit for military service and had to find a sedentary job: he became an accountant and excelled in this profession, which implied, at that time, mainly hand-written work. He started working in the Poitiers area and then moved a little farther north to C...
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