Dendritic cells were first described by Paul Langerhans (Langerhans cells) in the late nineteenth century. It wasn't until 1973, however, that Ralph Steinman and Zanvil Cohn gave them the name 'dendritic cells'. For discovering the central role of dendritic cells in the adaptive immune response, Steinman was awarded the Albert Lasker Award in 2007, and the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2011.