A British scientist whose schoolmasters told him he was too stupid to study the subject has been awarded the Nobel Prize in medicine or physiology for his pioneering work on cloning.

At the age of 15, Prof Sir John Gurdon ranked last out of the 250 boys in his Eton year group at biology, and was in the bottom set in every other science subject.

Sixty-four years later he has been recognised as one of the finest minds of his generation after being awarded the £750,000 annual prize, which he shares with Japanese stem cell researcher Shinya Yamanaka.

Speaking after learning of his award in London on Monday, Sir John revealed that his school report still sits above his desk at the Gurdon Institute in Cambridge, which is named in his honour.

While it might be less than complimentary, noting that for him to study science at University would be a "sheer waste of time", Sir John said it is the only item he has ever framed.

The master, a Mr Gaddum, was in fact a museum curator by profession who had been hired to teach the lowest-achieving pupils and was not in fact a particularly effective teacher, he explained.

He said: "The main gist of it was that he had heard Gurdon was interested in doing science and that this was a completely ridiculous idea because there was no hope whatever of my doing science.

"When you have problems like an experiment doesn't work, which often happens, it's nice to remind yourself that perhaps after all you are not so good at this job and the schoolmaster may have been right."

After receiving the report Sir John said he switched his attention to classics and was offered a place to study at Christ Church, Oxford, but was allowed to switch courses and read zoology instead because of a mix-up in the admissions office.

It was at Oxford as a postgraduate student that he published his groundbreaking research on genetics and proved for the first time that every cell in the body contains the same genes.

He did so by taking a cell from an adult frog's intestine, removing its genes and implanting them into an egg cell, which grew into a clone of the adult frog.

The idea was controversial at the time because it contradicted previous studies by much more senior scientists, and it was a decade before the then-graduate student's work became widely accepted.

But it later led directly to the cloning of Dolly the Sheep by Prof Ian Wilmut in 1996, and to the subsequent discovery by Prof Yamanaka that adult cells can be "reprogrammed" into stem cells for use in medicine.

This means that cells from someone's skin can be made into stem cells which in turn can turn into any type of tissue in the body, meaning they can replace diseased or damaged tissue in patients.

Sir John admitted it would have been "particularly nice" if Prof Wilmut had been given a third share of the award, but said he would celebrate nonetheless with a drinks reception at Cambridge last night.

He joined the university in 1971 following spells at the California Institute of Technology and Oxford, and in 1989 was a founding member of the Wellcome/CRC Institute for Cell Biology and Cancer - later renamed the Gurdon Institute - where he still works full-time at the age of 79.

He revealed that he had first heard about his prize when an Italian newspaper telephoned him in his laboratory to ask for his reaction at 7.30am on Monday morning, but dismissed their information as speculation.

An hour later he received a call from the Swedish Academy telling him he had won the prize, but admitted he was initially suspicious that the call was a hoax by a friend or colleague speaking in a Swedish accent.

Sir John professed to be unaware of the cash prize that awaits, but said he would most likely invest it in a fund he has previously set up to support PhD students during their fourth year of study.

He added that he would be back in the lab where at his customary early hour this morning. "It isn’t going to be particularly productive to clear off to some exotic place and I don’t have a yacht,” he explained.

Sir John's award could be followed by another British success if Prof Peter Higgs is given the Nobel Prize for physics after the discovery of a particle matching his 50-year-old theory by Cern this year.

But despite the public clamour for Prof Higgs to win the award after the huge public interest in his work, the fact the Cern results have not yet been verified by independent researchers may prove a stumbling block.

     英国人约翰·格登刚刚因细胞研究获得2012年度诺贝尔医学奖。不过，英国《每日电讯报》8日爆料称，格登在求学期间，曾被老师称为“笨得完全不应该学习自然科学”。

    《每日电讯报》报道称，15岁时，在英国的贵族中学伊顿公学上学的格登学习成绩很不理想，生物学的成绩在同年级的250名学生中排名垫底，其他自然科学类学科的成绩也都处于下游。

    然而，64年以后，格登却凭借在细胞研究方面的突出成就赢得了诺贝尔奖。获悉自己得奖的消息后，格登透露说，当年伊顿公学的成绩单如今还放在他任职的剑桥大学下属格登研究所办公桌上。

    格登说，这张成绩单是他装在框内摆放起来的东西，因为这让他想起一名中学老师对他的嘲讽，宣称他如果在大学选择自然科学专业，将“完全是一种浪费时间的做法”。

    据格登介绍，这名老师名叫加德姆，其实并不是一名真正的老师，而是一个博物馆馆长，被校方雇用用来教那些成绩最差的学生。 “他当时知道我对自然科学感兴趣的时候，嘲笑我说‘这是个非常荒唐的想法，因为你不可能在自然科学方面取得任何成绩。 ’”

    格登说，办公桌上的成绩单，让他在“遭遇经常发生的类似实验失败的问题时，会想到自己或许还做的不够好，那个老师说的或许有道理。 ”

    格登还透露说，在收到伊顿公学的那份成绩单后，他将自己的注意力转移到了古典文学方面，随后获得了在牛津大学基督堂学院学习的机会。不过，出于一些原因，格登入学后将专业换成了动物学。

    直到在牛津大学攻读硕士学位的时候，格登才发表了一篇在基因学领域具有开创性意义的研究论文，指出细胞的特化机能可以逆转。这一认定挑战生物学界先前所持有的“信条”，即对应于特定生物机能的特化细胞发育过程不可逆。

    直到10年以后，格登提出的这个观点才得到普遍接受。而这个观点最终直接引领英国胚胎学家伊恩·威尔穆特在1996年成功培育出了世界上只体细胞克隆羊“多利”。

    格登表示，如果威尔穆特能够与他一起获得今年的诺贝尔医学奖，“将是一个更好的结果”。

    格登介绍说，自己得知获得诺贝尔奖的消息还是来自一家意大利媒体打来的电话，当时是8日早晨7时30分左右，他身在实验室，电话另一头要他谈谈自己的反应。不过，格登认为他们的消息并不一定准确。

    一个小时以后，格登接到了来自瑞典文学院的电话，告诉他获得了诺贝尔医学奖。一开始，格登依然怀疑是朋友或同事故意假装瑞典口音，跟他开了一个玩笑，直到最后确认获奖的消息。

    格登将和另一名获奖者日本人山中伸弥平分800万瑞典克朗（约合114万美元）奖金。对于这笔奖金，格登表示自己可能将奖金拨给他此前设立的一个基金，用于资助一些攻读博士学位的学生。

    瑞典卡罗琳医学院8日在斯德哥尔摩宣布，将2012年诺贝尔生理学或医学奖授予英国科学家约翰·格登和日本科学家山中伸弥，以表彰他们在细胞研究领域作出的突出贡献。

    诺贝尔奖评选委员会在当天的一份声明中说，两位科学家因“发现成熟细胞可以被重新编程为多功能的干细胞（即诱导多功能干细胞）”而获奖，他们的研究成果彻底改变了人类对细胞和生物体发展的认识。

    声明说，人类从受精卵细胞开始发育，在受孕的天后，胚胎由未成熟细胞组成，每一个未成熟细胞都能发展成形成成年肌体的所有细胞类型，这样的细胞被称为多功能干细胞。随着胚胎的发育，这些细胞进一步形成神经细胞、肌细胞和肝细胞等在人体内承担特殊机能的细胞。很长一段时间里，人们曾认为未成熟细胞发展成特定成熟细胞是单向性的，不可能再回复到多功能干细胞的阶段。

    格登早在1962年通过一项经典实验，发现已分化的特定成熟细胞要想变回“从前”，是可逆的。 40多年后，山中伸弥发现完整的特定成熟细胞如何在老鼠体内重组成为非成熟干细胞，通过引入少数基因，他能将特定成熟细胞重新编程为诱导多功能干细胞，这种细胞与其他多功能干细胞的特点一样，都能发育成各种其他器官的细胞，因此具有重大的医学研究价值。

    诺贝尔奖评选委员会认为，这些突破性的研究完全改变了人类对自身发展和细胞分化的认识，现在人们知道已分化的特定细胞不一定仅局限于其专门的状态。随着教科书的改写，新的相关领域研究也被确立。通过对人体细胞的重新编程，科学家开辟出了疾病研究的新途径，并为疾病治疗找到了新突破口。
今年的诺贝尔生理学或医学奖奖金共800万瑞典克朗（约合114万美元），由两名获奖者平分。

    今年诺贝尔生理学或医学奖得主山中伸弥说，得到获奖通知时，正在家中修理洗衣机。

    山中伸弥现年50岁，在日本京都大学任职。他8日在京都大学举行的新闻发布会上说：“我没想到能获奖。当天在家里，洗衣机‘咔嗒、咔嗒’响。我刚想修理洗衣机，手机响了，对方说英语。我得知自己获奖。”

    山中说，日本和其他国家有资格获得诺贝尔奖的人很多，接到电话时，不敢相信自己获奖。

    山中现在任京都大学“诱导多能干细胞”（iPS）研究和应用中心主任，6年前发表有关“诱导多能干细胞”的研究成果。他和英国人约翰·格登因在“诱导多能干细胞”领域的发现今年共同获奖。

    山中在新闻发布会上说：“发表‘诱导多能干细胞’研究报告后5到6年，我获得国家很大支持，否则可能不会接到来自斯德哥尔摩的电话……感激是我现在能说出的词。”诺贝尔生理学或医学奖评审委员会位于瑞典首都斯德哥尔摩卡罗琳医学院。

    山中与日本首相野田佳彦通电话，感谢国家支持。