There has been an ongoing and ugly legal battle over rights to the CRISPR/Cas technology for gene editing, which has swiftly become an important tool in the molecular biology toolbox. I think most of us agree that the people most responsible for the discovery are Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier, but then the Broad Institute under Eric Lander saw a hot topic, threw bodies at the problem, and rushed to get their fingers in the pie, including, as a sneaky tactic, publishing a review article that downplayed the role of Doudna/Charpentier. It was a nasty, greedy game they were playing, and I’d hoped people would see through it.
Apparently they did, because now Doudna and Charpentier have been awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Justice served!
It’s clear now that history has stamped Doudna and Charpentier with the credit for this scientific discovery, which is nice. I doubt that that will matter much to the legal system which determines who gets stamped with all the money from the patents, but it is a step forward.
Eric Lander et al may get the money, but it is the two ladies (thank you for increasing the still tiny number of women laureates) who will get institutes named after them, and be mobbed by students and science journalists wherever they go.
This century will be the century of genetic engineering, just as the two previous centuries were the centuries of metal hardware. Biofuels, medicines and things we have not yet conceived of will depend on this work.
Repairing the biosphere with GM plants will depend on this work. Bloody well everything will build on this.
NB translation error:
The term I am looking for would mean “be surrounded by/almost trampled by crowds/fans/admirers” ,
not ‘mobbed” (for examples of other weird translations, see the film title “Stalker”)
“….engulfed by..”?
Rosalind Franklin recompense
IE overlooked by Nobel when awarding Watson and Crick the award for the discovery of DNA structure
Since Doudna is at UC Berkeley, she’ll get something else out of this… Winning a Nobel prize is about the only way to get a personal parking space on campus.
Was Rosalind Franklin still alive at the time?
It is my understanding she died of cancer, and the Nobel rules do not allow for posthumous awards (although at least one laureate died days before being awarded the prize, and the committe was unaware of this fact).
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A much worse case is the discoverer of pulsars (forgive me for not recalling get name) who was overlooked while the professor got the prize. Fred Hoyle got quite upset about it.
whheydt @5
Is Berkeley one of those places that is using parking tickets as a way to get money? I have heard horror stories about some universities that strive to operate like companies….
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I hope Doudna et al have public communication skills like Neil DeGrasse Tyson. There are legions of know-nothings that are scaremongering about every and all applications of GM.
Watson and Crick published their article in Nature 1952 or 1953 behind the back of Franklin.
Franklin died 1958.
Watson and Crick got the prize 1962.
If Franklin’s contribution was known to the Nobel committe, they ought definitely to have brought this up, even if they could not formally let her estate share the Prize. The big villains in the tale are however Francis and Crick.
Re: birgerjohansson @ #7…
One has to distinguish between UC Berkeley–a state institution–and the surrounding city of Berkeley. The city hates cars. The university is, so far as I’ve ever encountered, neutral on them. It’s fairly easy to park temporarily on campus. Just drive up to the gate and give a plausible reason (e.g. I have to drop books at the main library) and you get a short-term parking pass. To park regularly, and for long periods on campus, you need a permit and–usually–an assigned spot. That’s what winning a Nobel prize gets you. There are a number of university-run parking lots around campus.
birgerjohansson @6:
You probably mean Jocelyn Bell Burnell. In her own words:
“Mobbed” is the right word. It means exactly that:
https://www.thefreedictionary.com/mobbed
Loree @11 Thanks! English is tricky, especiaĺly when I know just enough to feel unfounded confidence….
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I think we will hear more about Charpentier and Doudna than we ever heard of Watson and Crick. This is engineering-level knowledge that can be applied to lots of everyday biochemical problems.
Biodiesel, biopetroleum, producing complex pharmaceutical molecules from yeast, turning harmless viruses into vaccines for deadly diseases, and things we haven’t thought of yet.
Strongly recommended:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30971755-a-crack-in-creation
And it’s the first Nobel science prize to be awarded to two women.
Kudos to Doudna and Charpentier. A well-deserved award for a major scientific contribution.
I’ve met Doudna twice. A very intelligent and engaging person in my experience. Good for her!