Jurados

Dr. Gary Ruvkun is a professor at the prestigious Harvard Medical School and a researcher at Massachusetts General Hospital. He shared the 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology with Victor Ambros, as they both discovered the importance of microRNAs. These short RNA chains, the molecule discovered in 1956 by Severo Ochoa, are very small sequences that not only do not code for proteins, as described by Ochoa, but also block the activity of DNA genes, thus regulating the functions of animal and plant cells. Their function is like putting a stick between the spokes of a wheel to prevent the cart from moving forward.

That is, cells contain the genome, a large group of genes that organize cellular activities. Although all cells in the body have the same genome, each tissue expresses different genes, and in this way, organs with different functions arise. The liver, heart, and brain have the same genes, but genetic regulation causes them to produce different proteins, resulting in different appearances and functions. In 1993, Gary Ruvkun and Victor Ambros discovered a new type of gene control mechanism: microRNAs. These are small sequences of nucleotides that regulate genes by preventing certain proteins from forming. This mechanism is fundamental to the development of different tissues with different functions. It is essential for understanding how different organs form in animals and plants and how alterations in this process can lead to genetic diseases and malformations.

Social applications

Because microRNAs block protein formation, they allow for the control of protein presence in an organism.

This has great utility in medicine, agriculture, microbiology, and molecular biology. First, it allows for the silencing of genes and the discovery of their function, which is very important in basic research.

In medicine, it could be very useful for eradicating infections by preventing microorganisms from synthesizing proteins that allow them to survive or recover from injury, by eliminating toxic substances produced by cells, and by blocking autoimmune antibodies that cause disease by attacking our own cells. It could also prevent the division of tumor cells, reducing the size of the cancer. Due to their effectiveness, once a disease mechanism is understood, they could be useful in the treatment of rare diseases and metabolic disorders, such as certain neurodegenerative diseases caused by the production of an abnormal protein. They would also allow for the identification of biomarkers—that is, substances that appear or disappear from the blood or tissues in certain diseases.

In agriculture, they could be very useful by reducing pests' defenses against the products used to destroy them, or even by blocking the production of proteins necessary for their survival. They can also improve crops by preventing the expression of genes that slow plant growth, give fruit an unattractive color, etc.