Word: ruvkun
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...light of the researchers’ work with miRNAs, Ruvkun, who received a Ph.D in biophysics from Harvard, said that scientists are now shifting their attention to smaller genes that otherwise might not have been studied. Recent research suggests an increasing awareness of the role of these genes, as over 500 miRNAs contained in the human genome may control a third of protein-coding genes...
...most important thing is it sort of revealed a world of regulation that was mediated by smaller genes that we’ve never envisioned before,” Ruvkun said. “It’s sort of a lens through which one can view biology...
Previously, Ruvkun added, the smallest RNA known to be of importance in cells consisted of 75 nucleotide building blocks. The miRNA they worked with was composed of 22 nucleotides...
Twenty years ago, Ruvkun and Ambros, then fellows working in the laboratory of MIT professor H. Robert Horvitz, began studying the genes that control the development of the Caenorhabditis elegans, a 1 mm-long roundworm that biologists often use as a model organism, from newly-hatched larva to fully-grown adult...
...Ruvkun said that it took approximately 10 years to “sniff around the whole thing” to unearth the genetic regulatory role of miRNAs in worms and another decade to confirm that these genes execute similar functions during growth and development of other creatures including humans, fruit flies, frogs, and sea urchins...