Laureate on a mission

TCM enthusiast

Neher's story with China is one of serendipity, driven by his immense interest in TCM.

The honor of being awarded the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine in 1991 along with German cell physiologist Bert Sakmann won Neher worldwide fame as countries made a beeline for his counsel and academic expertise.

"I did get offers, of course. But the offer here was particularly attractive because I'm going to learn more about the ingredients of traditional Chinese medicine," he tells China Daily in an exclusive interview in Macao.

"I've always been interested in traditional Chinese medicine, and I saw potential in using the techniques I had developed to study the components that you can isolate from traditional Chinese medicine formulations," he says, referring to his job at the MUST lab where he combines his research on ion channels with TCM to explore the effects of some small molecules in Chinese herbal medicine through ion channels to find solutions for various diseases.

A longtime fan of TCM, Neher jumped on the chance, saying it's a continuation of his research from the 1980s in which he and Sakmann developed a new technology to record the abnormal activity of ion channels that are closely linked to conditions like cancer, inflammation, Alzheimer's disease and stroke.

Neher is convinced that TCM, developed over thousands of years in China, has identified substances that work in various ways. He says formulations of TCM contain numerous substances that influence the human body's signal mechanisms. "We have learned so much in the past 30 to 50 years about these signals (in our bodies) that it's time to look into the formulations of TCM." Besides doing academic research with TCM, the biophysicist, who is currently recovering from a fractured ankle, says that he is trying some TCM given to him by a friend to speed up bone regeneration.

"I must say I don't know many other laboratories in this field. But what's here is very impressive. The school has basically everything in terms of analytical instrumentation that you can imagine."

The MUST lab is supported by the Science and Technology Development Fund (FDCT) - a research fund set up by the Macao SAR government in 2004. Members of the lab are also accessible to national funding programs.

Neher says the funds have enabled the facility to compete with others. In 2020, the FDCT allocated 170 million patacas ($21.21 million) for 141 scientific research projects. The funding grew to 300 million patacas for 200 projects in 2021, and to 350 million patacas for 214 projects in 2022.