Nobel Prize Gossip: Why Did Greg Hannon Not Win? : Pure Pedantry

Reality is always more complicated than you think.

Profile

Jake Young is a MD/PhD student at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in NYC getting a PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience. He holds a BS and MS in Biological Sciences from Stanford University. If a volcano were to erupt Pompei-style in Central Park, his body would be preserved in a scoliotic posture over his lab desk. Archeaologists would later conclude that he spent most of his day training rats to perform tricks, until he went blind building electrical equipment by hand using a dissecting microscope. But, still, he died happy...because science is cool.

Pure Pedantry is a blog about science -- social sciences and otherwise -- as well as academic and scientific culture. No one can live on science alone, so I also like to dwell on pop culture, periodically explore the humanities, and indulge in other types of geeky goodness.

DISCLAIMERS: 1) Jake Young is not a licensed physician (yet). He is merely a medical student. The information published on this site is not intended for use in medical decision-making. Please seek advice from a licensed, medical professional before making any health decisions. 2) The opinions expressed are my own. They do not represent the views of SEED magazine or the educational establishments I currently attend or attended in the past.

Search

Nobel Prize Gossip: Why Did Greg Hannon Not Win?

Category: Gossip • Prizes
Posted on: October 2, 2006 9:38 AM, by NotoriousLTP

I was just thinking about something. The Nobel Committee is usually mysterious in how they pick the winners, but why did Greg Hannon not win the Nobel with the others? My understanding was that he was sort of the guy for RNA interference. In fact, the review that I cited in my last post came from him because I know that he has written all kinds of reviews about it.

Also, a lab mate of mine mentioned this: why did they win Medicine and not Chemistry? Because RNAi treatments have ended up being such loads of hype. It has ended up being such a load because no one can get enough of it into a person to make it work.

Here is an open thread to speculate on such matters and other matters of molecular biologist gossip.

Share this: Facebook Twitter Stumbleupon Reddit Email + More

Comments

Oh I could not agree with anything in this post!

RNAi has been a revolution! Ask anyone who works with higher eukaryotic systems. It's a new paradigm of how cells regulate gene function. It's allowed Cell Biologists and Developmental biologists to knock out genes. It was a true shift in how we view gene regulation.

As for Greg Hannon, he did not discover RNAi, in fact he did not make any of the "first" discoveries. Everyone expected Mello and Fire to get it, but they should have included either Ambrose (who discovered microRNAs) or Rich Jorgensen who FIRST DISCOVERED RNAi in petunias. I guess flower science doesn't get any respect.

Posted by: apalazzo | October 2, 2006 9:55 AM

"Also, a lab mate of mine mentioned this: why did they win Medicine and not Chemistry? Because RNAi treatments have ended up being such loads of hype."

They won for "Physiology or Medicine", and they won for their basic scientific discoveries concerning the phsyiological roles of RNAi. Whether RNAi does or does not itself become a useful medical treatment has nothing to do with the huge importance of their discoveries. (I have no idea whether it is likely to or not.)

Posted by: PhysioProf | October 2, 2006 7:41 PM

I happen to find this blog from a random google search. Unfortunately, people win the Nobel prize for opening up a field, not for making major breakthroughs in it (like finding Slicer-argonaute 2 and Dicer). So while Andy Fire worked (with Mello) to discover RNAi, he has not made the number of notable discoveries within RNAi that Greg Hannon has done in the last 9 years. Check out cited papers for proof (http://sciencewatch.com/ana/fea/08janfebFea/).
The plant community was forgotten with this nobel and it should have been split with someone from that field.

Posted by: DS | September 15, 2009 4:27 PM