The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2024 has been awarded to American scientists Victor Ambrose and Gary Ruvkun for their work on microRNAs.

His discoveries help explain how life on Earth became so complex and how the human body is made up of a variety of different tissues.

MicroRNAs influence how genes – the instructions for life – are regulated inside organisms, including us.

The winners share prize money of 11 million Swedish kronor (£810,000).

Every cell in the human body contains the same raw genetic information, locked in our DNA.

But despite starting with the same genetic information, the cells of the human body vary greatly in size and function.

The electrical impulses of nerve cells are different from the rhythmic beating of heart cells. The metabolic powerhouse that is the liver cell is different from the kidney cell which filters urea from the blood. The light-sensing abilities of cells in the retina are different than those of the white blood cells that produce antibodies to fight infection.

Such diversity can arise from the same starting material due to gene expression.

American scientists were the first to discover microRNAs and how they control how genes are expressed differently in different tissues.

Medicine and Physiology laureates are selected by the Nobel Assembly of Karolinska Institutet, Sweden.

He said: “Their groundbreaking discovery led to an entirely new principle of gene regulation that proved essential for multicellular organisms, including humans.

“It is now known that the human genome codes for over a thousand microRNAs.”

Without the ability to control gene expression every cell of an organism would be identical, so microRNAs helped enable the evolution of complex life-forms.

Abnormal regulation by microRNAs may contribute to cancer and some conditions including congenital hearing loss and bone disorders.

A serious example is DICER1 syndrome, which causes cancer in a variety of tissues and is caused by mutations that affect microRNAs.

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