IVF pioneer Robert Edwards wins Nobel Prize

British IVF pioneer Professor Robert Edwards, the man behind the world's first test tube baby, has been awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine.

The 85-year-old emeritus professor at the University of Cambridge was honoured 55 years after he first began his research into fertility and 32 years after the birth of Louise Brown (above with Edwards), the first child to be conceived using in vitro fertilisation - a process by which egg cells are fertilised outside the body.

Since then, more than four million babies have been born to parents who otherwise would have failed to conceive children.

After serving in World War II, Edwards studied biology at the University of Wales in Bangor, in 1955 he began work on a PhD at Edinburgh University studying the development of embryos in mice.

In the late 1960s he began working with gynaecological surgeon Patrick Steptoe and the pair developed a technique of fertilising human eggs outside the body and then implanting them in the womb. Their efforts came to fruition with the birth of Louise Brown in 1978 and led to the creation of a new field of medicine.

Christer Höög, professor of cell biology at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm and a member of the Nobel Assembly explained why Edwards had won the prize. He said: "By a brilliant combination of basic and applied medical research, Edwards overcame one technical hurdle after another in his persistence to discover a method that would help to alleviate infertility.

"This discovery represents a monumental medical advance that can truly be said to confer the 'greatest benefit to mankind'. Human IVF has radically changed the field of reproductive medicine."

Although Edwards was too frail to give interviews after the announcement his colleagues paid tribute to him. Mike Macnamee, chief executive of Bourn Hall, the IVF clinic set up by Professor Edwards near Cambridge, said: "Bob is one of our greatest scientists. His inspirational work in the early 60s led to a breakthrough that has enhanced the lives of millions of people worldwide."

The Nobel award comes with a cash prize of 10m Swedish kronor (around £930,000). ·