Nobel Prize in medicine – comment by prof. Rafał Bartoszewski of the UWr Faculty of Biotechnology
American biologists Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun have been named this year’s winners of the Nobel Prize in Medicine or Physiology. What were they recognized for? The microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional regulation of gene activity is discussed by our researcher prof. Rafał Bartoszewski, who specializes in, among other things, new anti-cancer therapies.
At the heart of the development of modern medicine, capable of delivering therapies that can transform lives and, until recently, cure terminally ill patients, lies an understanding of the molecular mechanisms responsible for the development of diseases.
The key is how the information stored in our genetic code is read and interpreted.
Groundbreaking research on this problem has been rewarded with Nobel Prizes over the years, starting with the one in 1962 for Francis Crick, who proposed the central dogma, a model of information flow from DNA, through RNA, to protein.
This year’s Nobel Prize was awarded to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun for their 1993 discovery in the non-parasitic nematode Caenorhabditis elegans of a short non-coding RNA with potential biological function, named lin-4.
Together with similar molecules discovered later, they were assigned to a new class of RNAs, the microRNAs. The function of these short molecules is to manage the lifespan of transcripts and their use in protein production.
MicroRNAs were subsequently identified in many organisms, including plants and viruses.
It was not until 2001 that the first functional microRNAs in humans, miR-21, were described. Further research has shown that our cells use a complex network of these molecules to develop and manage all aspects of their lives.
In humans, about 2,000 microRNAs have been discovered so far, each of which can theoretically manage the production of at least several hundred proteins, and vice versa, the production of a given protein can be controlled by dozens of microRNAs simultaneously. Thus, it is an extremely complex system that allows us to adjust the production of proteins in the cells to the current needs of our body.
Not surprisingly, dysfunction of the microRNA-based homeostasis control system can lead to or accompany diseases. In this context, understanding the consequences of changes in individual microRNA profiles in humans may contribute to the development of breakthrough diagnostic and perhaps, in the future, therapeutic strategies.
However, the latter aspect is extremely difficult due to the pleiotropic mechanism of action of microRNAs, and although artificial analogs and inhibitors of these molecules exist, their application is fraught with a high risk of adverse effects.
At the same time, awareness of the impact of microRNAs on human protein levels both in terms of physiology and pathology has made it possible to revise and supplement existing hypotheses in biological and medical sciences. These advances, although difficult to apply directly at present, should support further medical development in the future.
Prof. dr hab. Rafał Bartoszewski from the Department of Biophysics at the UWr Faculty of Biotechnology, is one of our scientists on the TOP 2% list of most influential researchers https://uwr.edu.pl/coraz-wiecej-naukowcow-uwr-w-top-2-najczesciej-cytowanych-na-swiecie/ has been working for years on, among other things, new anti-cancer therapies.
