Gary Ruvkun (Harvard): The Small RNA Revolution: A perfect storm

Talk Overview: The discovery of small non-coding RNAs that regulate mRNA expression and translation levels added an exciting new layer of complexity to the control of gene expression. In his talk, Gary Ruvkun describes the experiments that led to the identification of the first microRNA, lin-4, which downregulates the translation of lin-14, a protein needed in the early development of the model organism C. elegans. Since then, a wide variety of small regulatory non-coding RNAs that affect numerous cellular processes have been discovered in almost every organism. Speaker Biography: Gary Ruvkun is a Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School. His lab has been instrumental in identifying the regulation mechanisms of microRNAs, and was the first to show that microRNAs were conserved amongst animals. Ruvkun is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Ruvkun has won numerous awards, including the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research and the Louisa Horwitz Prize from Columbia University for his work on non-coding RNAs.