Carlsson, Arvid (1923– )

Swedish pharmacologist who with US neurobiologists Paul Greengard and Eric R Kandel shared the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 2000 for their discoveries concerning signal transduction in the nervous system. Carlsson discovered that dopamine is an important transmitter in the brain, especially in the basal ganglia, a part of the brain responsible for the control of movement.

It had been thought that dopamine was only the precursor to the neurotransmitter noradrenaline. However, Carlsson found that dopamine was present in parts of the brain where noradrenaline was not, indicating that it was a neurotransmitter in its own right. To prove the connection between dopamine and motor functions, he treated animals with reserpine, a substance known to deplete synaptic transmitters, which made them lose their ability to move normally. He was able to restore normal motor function to these animals by giving them L-dopa, a precursor of dopamine. His research led to the discovery that Parkinson's disease was caused by a shortage of dopamine in the brain. L-dopa has been developed as a drug to combat this disease and is currently the most important treatment for it.

Carlsson was born in Uppsala, Sweden. He was appointed professor of pharmacology at the University of Göteborg, Sweden, in 1959 and became professor emeritus there in 1989.