US researchers Victor Ambros and Gary Ravkan have won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine for discovering microRNA and determining its role in genetics. The scientists found that these cells control protein-coding genes.
The statement said:
The Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institutet has decided to award the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine jointly to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun “for the discovery of microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional gene regulation.”
Victor Ambros, professor of natural sciences at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, and Gary Ruvkun, professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School, were born in the US in 1953 and 1952, respectively, the institute said on its website.
In the late 1980s, the scientists “were postdoctoral fellows in the lab of Robert Horvitz, who won the Nobel Prize in 2002,” it said.
They “wanted to identify mutated genes and understand their functions” by studying the 1-millimetre-long roundworm, C. elegans, “a useful model for studying how tissues develop and mature in multicellular organisms,” the report also said.
Ambros and Ruvkun then continued to develop their research separately. Victor Ambros conducted his research at Harvard University, while Ruvkun conducted his research at Massachusetts General Hospital.
The American scientists are the first beneficiaries of the Nobel Prize in 2024. The announcement of the laureates takes place in Oslo and Stockholm in October 7-14. On October 8 the names of the winners of the award in Physics will be announced, on October 9 – in Chemistry, on October 10 – in Literature and on October 11 the Nobel Peace Prize winner will be named.
Last year, the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine was awarded to Hungarian biochemist Katalin Kariko and American Drew Weissman for their discoveries that led to the development of effective mRNA vaccines against coronavirus.
