The city of Paris Grand Vermeil Medal rewards the work of biologist Ana Soto for her pioneering role in the discovery of endocrine disruptors. Her research, conducted in partnership with Carlos Sonnenschein (Tufts University School of Medicine and Centre Cavailles), highlighted the endocrine disrupting action of many molecules commonly used in industrial products (such as Bisphenol A) and also demonstrated the impact of these molecules on carcinogenesis (the formation of cancers).
The work of Ana Soto and Carlos Sonnenschein also encompasses theoretical and epistemological issues arising from the study of complex biological phenomena. In collaboration with Giuseppe Longo, at the Center Cavaillès within the La Republique des Savoirs (Republic of Knowledge) at the Ecole Normale Superieure of Paris they identified principles required to build a theory of organisms compatible with Darwin’s theory of evolution.
Combining their experience as experimentalists and theoreticians, Ana Soto and Carlos Sonnenschein, postulated the tissue organization field of carcinogenesis (The Society of Cells, Bios-Springer-Verlag, 1999, published also in French in 2006, in Spanish in 2018 and it is now being translated to Italian), in which cancer is viewed as development gone awry.