The 2024 Nobel Prize in Medicine has been given to American scientists Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun for their role in the groundbreaking discovery of microRNA, a tiny genetic molecule crucial for gene regulation.
According to the Nobel Committee news release on Monday, the research, conducted in the 1990s “revealed a new dimension to gene regulation, essential for all complex life forms,” including humans.
“We know from genetic research that cells and tissues do not develop normally without microRNAs,” the committee wrote.
They further added, “Abnormal regulation by microRNA can contribute to cancer, and mutations in genes coding for microRNAs have been found in humans, causing conditions such as congenital hearing loss, eye and skeletal disorders.”
Ambros is a professor of natural science at the University of Massachusetts Medical School while Ruvkun serve as a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School.
The committee further said that when the duo breakthrough study “were initially met with almost deafening silence from the scientific community.”
“Over the following years, hundreds of different microRNAs were identified. Today, we know that there are more than a thousand genes for different microRNAs in humans, and that gene regulation by microRNA is universal among multicellular organisms,” the Nobel committee added.
