Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun have won the Nobel Prize for Medicine 2024 for “the discovery of microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional gene regulation”.
About Nobel Prize
- Categories: Nobel Prize is a set of five international prizes awarded annually in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, and Peace.
- Origin :The Nobel Prize was established by the will of Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite.
- First awarded in 1901 on the 5th anniversary of the death of Alfred Nobel.
- In 1968, a sixth prize was introduced in Economic Sciences (Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences) but is not officially called a Nobel Prize.
- Venue: The prizes are awarded by the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden.
- The Peace Prize is awarded in Oslo, Norway.
- Eligibility: It can only be awarded to individuals except for the peace prize that can be conferred on individuals or institutions.
- A maximum of 3 individuals can share a prize.
Notable Awards in Medicine
- James D. Watson is a Nobel Prize-winning scientist for his work on DNA and genetics.
- The 2023 Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman for their work on messenger Ribonucleic Acid (mRNA).
Nobel Prize and India
- Rabindranath Tagore was the first non-European and Indian to receive a Nobel Prize in 1913 for Literature.
- India’s first Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to Sir Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman in 1930 for his work on the scattering of light and the discovery of the Raman Effect.
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What is MicroRNA (miRNA)?
MicroRNA (miRNA) is a class of small, non-coding RNA molecules that regulates gene expression in cells by binding to messenger RNAs (mRNAs) and blocking them from making proteins.
- Non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs) are molecules that do not encode proteins.
Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun
- Both Ambros and Ruvkun are American biologists.
- Ambros currently works at the Programme in Molecular Medicine at the University of Massachusetts in the U.S.
- Ruvkun is a professor of genetics at the Harvard Medical School and researches microRNA and RNA interference mechanisms at the Ruvkun Lab at Massachusetts General Hospital.
- Their research revealed a new class of tiny RNA molecules critical for regulating gene activity, essential for multicellular organisms’ development and function.
- This breakthrough, first made in the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans.
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- Examples include miRNAs, long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs), circular RNAs (circRNAs), Piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs), ribosomal RNAs (rRNAs), and transfer RNAs (tRNAs).
- Composition: miRNAs are approximately 21 to 24 nucleotides long, much smaller than messenger RNAs (mRNAs), which carry instructions for protein synthesis.
- Their small size allows them to bind to specific target mRNAs.
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Discovery of MicroRNAs
- miRNAs were first discovered in Caenorhabditis elegans, a nematode worm, by Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun in 1993.
- miRNAs are found in cells and in the bloodstream.
Significance of MicroRNAs
- Role in biological processes :They are significant for different biological processes such as cell proliferation, differentiation, apoptosis, and immune response.
- Biological Regulation: They also regulate cholesterol metabolism and are involved in cardiomyopathies and stroke.
- Role in pregnancy: MicroRNAs contribute to pregnancy development by regulating steps like trophoblast differentiation, embryo implantation, and maternal-foetal immune tolerance.
- Disease Implications: Alteration in miRNA expression can lead to changes in the gene expression profile, contributing to many human disorders.
- Abnormal expression of miRNA has been linked to many human cancers.
- Mutations in genes coding for microRNAs have been found in humans, causing conditions such as congenital hearing loss, eye and skeletal disorders
- Applications: A single micro-RNA can regulate the expression of many genes, and alternatively a single gene can also be controlled by multiple micro-RNAs.
- This leads to fine tuning of different types of cells despite similar genetic information.
- Understanding them is the first step towards further research.
How do miRNAs Control Gene Expression?
- miRNAs control gene expression by binding to mRNA in the cell cytoplasm.
- Instead of being quickly translated into protein, the marked mRNA is either destroyed and its components recycled or preserved for later translation.
- If the level of a specific miRNA is underexpressed (abnormally low), the protein it regulates may be overexpressed (unusually high level in the cell).
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Production and Cycle of MicroRNA
- Cells make microRNA through a process similar to the early steps of protein synthesis.
- When a microRNA gene is activated, the DNA strand opens up and is transcribed into RNA.
- The initial gene transcript is called primary miRNA (pri-miRNA).
- In the cell nucleus, these hairpin-loop molecules are cut to form double-stranded precursor miRNA (pre-miRNA).
- Pre-miRNA is transported to the cytoplasm, where it is further cut to form mature miRNA (about 22 nucleotides long).
- Mature miRNA binds with the RNA interference silencing complex (RISC).
- miRNA then binds to target mRNA, blocking its translation or triggering its degradation.
October 8, 2024
