(3 Oct 2006)
Boston, Massachusetts
1. Craig Mello, Joint winner of the 2006 Nobel Laureate for Medicine arriving at news conference
2. Students clapping
3. Wide of Mello with people surrounding him clapping
4. People clapping
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Craig Mello, Joint Winner of the 2006 Nobel Laureate for Medicine:
"So I was checking her sugar (his diabetic daughter's) and I came back to bed and the phone rang again and my wife said 'It's a crank call, don't pick it up!' (Mello laughing) But I said that they are announcing the Nobel Prize, so I said that I'd better pick it up!"
6. Reporters
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Craig Mello, Joint Winner of the2006 Nobel Laureate for Medicine:
"You know, the fact is, we have a great opportunity and it is sad to say that we are not spending enough money as a nation on basic research and on medical research."
8. Cameras
9. Mello shaking hands with supporters
Palo Alto, California
10. Various exteriors of Stanford University Medical Department
11. Journalist and cameras
12. Various of Andrew Fire, Joint winner of the 2006 Nobel Laureate for Medicine, walking on to stage to applause from crowd
13. Reporters
14. SOUNDBITE (English) Andrew Fire, 2006 Nobel Laureate for Medicine:
"Really the main application so far hasn't been any miraculous new medicine that has come out of nowhere from this, it's been understanding."
15. Cutaway of media
16. Various of Andrew Fire talking to media
17. Students in medical laboratory
18. Various of researchers looking in microscopes
19. Various of researchers in lab
20. Bunsen burners and petri dishes
STORYLINE
Americans Andrew Fire and Craig Mello won the Nobel prize in medicine on Monday for discovering a method of turning off selected genes, an important research tool that scientists hope will lead to new treatments for HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus), cancer and other illnesses.
The Karolinska Institute in Stockholm honoured the pair for their relatively recent discovery of RNA (ribonucleic acid) interference, which is a fundamental mechanism for controlling the flow of genetic information.
Mello told the media at the University of Massachusetts Club in downtown Boston how he found out about winning the award.
"The phone rang again and my wife said 'It's a crank call, don't pick it up!' But I said that they are announcing the Nobel Prize, so I said that I'd better pick it up," added Mello.
Fire's and Mello's findings, published in 1998, opened a new field of research that has helped researchers break down, or silence, specific genes to help neutralise harmful viruses and mutations.
Mello said the US were not spending, "enough money as a nation on basic research and on medical research."
RNA interference occurs in plants, animals, and humans.
It is already being widely used in basic science as a method to study the function of genes and it may lead to novel therapies in the future.
AIDS (Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome) researchers hope RNA interference can help them develop new drugs to fight viruses such as HIV.
A member of the Nobel Assembly at Karolinska, said RNA interference has already had a dramatic effect on the pharmaceutical and biotech industries.
Since the discovery, scientists have already made RNA interference a standard lab tool for studying what genes do.
And they are working to use it to develop treatments against a long list of illnesses, including asthma, cystic fibrosis, diabetes, flu, Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases, and age-related macular degeneration, a major cause of blindness.
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