At 4:30 p.m. on October 7 (Vietnam time), the Nobel Assembly at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, announced that the 2024 Nobel Prize in Medicine went to two American scientists, Victor Ambros (University of Massachusetts Medical School) and Gary Ruvkun (Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School) for their discovery of microRNA (micro RNA) and its role in gene regulation.
The information stored in our chromosomes can be likened to an instruction manual for all the cells in our body. Every cell contains the same chromosome, so every cell contains the same set of genes and the same set of instructions.
However, different cell types, such as muscle cells and nerve cells, have very distinct characteristics. How do these differences arise? The answer lies in gene regulation, which allows each cell to select only the relevant instructions. This ensures that only the correct set of genes is activated in each cell type.
Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun are interested in how different types of cells develop. They have discovered microRNA, a new class of tiny RNA molecules that play an important role in gene regulation.
The groundbreaking discovery by two scientists reveals a completely new principle of gene regulation, which is essential for multicellular organisms, including humans.
Genetic information flows from DNA to messenger RNA (mRNA), through a process called transcription, and then to the cellular machinery for protein production. There, mRNA is translated so that proteins are made according to the genetic instructions stored in DNA. Since the mid-20th century, some of the most fundamental scientific discoveries have explained how these processes work.
Our organs and tissues are made up of many different types of cells, all of which have identical genetic information stored in their DNA. However, these different cells express unique sets of proteins. How can this happen?
The answer lies in the precise regulation of gene activity so that only the correct set of genes are active in each specific cell type. This, for example, allows muscle cells, intestinal cells, and different types of nerve cells to perform their specialized functions.
In addition, gene activity must be constantly adjusted to adapt cellular functions to changing conditions in our bodies and environments.
If gene regulation goes awry, it can lead to serious diseases such as cancer, diabetes or autoimmune diseases. Therefore, understanding the regulation of gene activity has been an important goal for decades.
In the 1960s, it was demonstrated that specialized proteins, called transcription factors, could bind to specific regions in DNA and control the flow of genetic information by determining which mRNAs were produced.
Since then, thousands of transcription factors have been identified and for a long time it was believed that the main principles of gene regulation had been solved.
However, in 1993, Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun published unexpected findings describing a new level of gene regulation that was highly significant and conserved throughout evolution.
