miRNA Pioneers take the Lasker

I've been neglecting science lately but I just wanted to point out that Victor Ambros, Gary Ruvkun and David Baulcombe just won the Lasker Award in Basic Sciences for their work on miRNAs, small non-coding RNAs that are encoded in the genome. These 19-23 nucleotide long RNAs regulate the stability, localization and translation of mRNAs and have been implicated in almost every biological process from stem cells, to cancer to development.

Ambrose and Ruvkin are well known for their work on miRNAs and worm development, while the lesser known Baulcombe made similar discoveries in plants. These findings (along with RNAi in general) have led to one of the most important conceptual advances in biology within the past few decades.

-Boston Globe article
-Video from the Lasker site

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Ambros, not Ambrose. And if Baulcombe's work is lesser-known, it was earlier, and it is of at least equal fundamental importance. Further: note the Lasker lifetime achievement award for Stanley Falkow.

By George Smiley (not verified) on 15 Sep 2008 #permalink