Born on this day in 1945, Yoshinori Ohsumi won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine for elucidating autophagy, the cell's way of removing and recycling waste. The image below shows one of the final steps in the process, where an enzyme-filled lysosome fuses with the old cell components, causing degradation and recycling into basic components. This discovery has crucial implications for understanding diseases like cancer, aging, and neurodegenerative conditions, by highlighting the importance of cellular cleanup and recycling mechanisms.