Tu Youyou, 84, honored with the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine on Oct 5, 2015. She was the first Chinese citizen to win a Nobel Prize in science for her work in helping to create an anti-malaria  medicine. In 1967, Communist leader Mao Zedong decided there was an urgent national need to find a cure for malaria. At the time, malaria spread by mosquitoes was killing Chinese soldiers fighting Americans in the jungles of northern Vietnam. A secret research unit was formed to find a cure for the illness. Two years later, Tu Youyou was instructed to become the new head of Mission 523. Researchers in Mission523 _ ancient books to find historical methods of fighting malaria. When she started her search for an anti-malarial drug, over 240,000 compounds  around the world had already been tested, without any success. Finally, the team found a brief reference to one substance, sweet wormwood , which had been used to treat malaria in China around 400 AD. The team isolated one active compound in wormwood, artemisinin , which appeared to battle malaria-friendly parasites . The team then tested extracts  of the compound but nothing was effective until Tu Youyou returned to the original ancient text. After another careful reading, she improved the drug recipe one final time, heating the extract without allowing it to reach boiling point. After the drug showed promising results in mice and monkeys, Tu volunteered to be the first human recipient of the new drug. "As the head of the research group, I had the responsibility." she explained. What can we learn about the discovery of anti-malaria drug?
The process of testing extracts of the compound is very smooth. No one had ever done any research on it before Tu and her team. The idea of using wormwood to treat malaria was from ancient Chinese text Heating the extract until it reaches boiling point is necessary.