Did Harry Noller deserve the Nobel Prize?
Unless you have been living in a box, you have heard that the 2009 Nobel Prize for Chemistry was awarded for studies relating to the structure and function of the ribosome.
The winners: Ada Yonath, Thomas (Tom) Steitz and Venkatraman (Vanki) Ramakrishnan
The Nobel Prize allows for a maximum of three laureates, but did the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences get it right?
If you have not heard of Harry Noller, he was the first to propose that the ribosome is comprised of RNA. In addition to decades of devoted research, he also published extensively on the topic.
As reported by the NewsDaily.com:
Dr. Jeremy Berg, director of the NIH’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences, stated that “One of the reasons people have been unsure of the ribosome structure as a Nobel prize is that getting down to three people is tricky. Harry Noller of the University of California Santa Cruz has been one of the real leaders of sorting out the biochemistry of the ribosome for a long time.”
Professor Dana Carroll, who hired winner Venkatraman at the Univeristy of Utah was reported to believe that Harry Noller… should share a piece of the honor for his work in ribosome function.
The response across twitter was heartfelt:
The facebook page containing nearly 100 members dedicated to Harry’s Nobel Prize run was devastated.
Harry has been humble saying, “I’ve gotten more recognition than I deserve.”
I have started a new poll (to the right), feel free to give it a click.
What do you think? Is Harry the Rosalind Franklin of the 21st century?
[Results]
Abhishek Tiwari
October 15th, 2009 at 10:51 AM #
I guess we are asking wrong question rather than asking that Noller deserve or not, Of course he would have been there if there was no restriction on the numbers, rather than we should be questioning what is special about number 3. Recently I was watching the Nature Interview with Venkatraman Ramakrishnan where he suggested that people could have been more happier if there was no Nobel prize and they pursue the research for the sake of knowledge and wisdom.
Sean
October 15th, 2009 at 11:36 AM #
Hello Abhishek, thanks for the comment and brining to light a different perspective on the issue.
I agree that Noller would have won the award if there was not a restriction on the number of laureates, but for better or worse there is.
Venkatraman certainly could decline the award if that is what he believes, but am doubtful that will happen.
I do share the view the pursuit of research is to better understand nature and not to win a prize
Laura
October 15th, 2009 at 11:49 AM #
While Rosalind Franklin definitely got a rough deal, you can’t blame the Nobel committee for not giving her the award with Watson and Crick. They won the Nobel Prize for DNA in 1962; Franklin died in 1958. The Nobel Prize is not awarded posthumously.
Sean
October 15th, 2009 at 11:57 AM #
Hi Laura! Welcome.
Yes, great point. I am referring to the rough deal component as you mentioned.
This post maybe a stretch in comparing the situations – will be looking forward to the die hard Harry fans to drop a note.
Paul
October 15th, 2009 at 1:51 PM #
This reminds me of the controversy surrounding the 2003 Nobel prize in Medicine, where Raymond Damadian felt he got stiffed by the committee (and, to make matters worse, only 2 people were awarded the prize that time). With regards to the ribosome controversy, I’ve some some folks say that Peter Moore should also share some of the glory too. I guess with science becoming ever-more collaborative, this kind of stuff will become more and more common.
Abhishek Tiwari
October 16th, 2009 at 6:37 AM #
Interesting discussion Sean. I shaw your comment on Curious wave function
and I am dragging it here on your post. Well let it put in other way, who do you think was least deserving candidate out of three?
David
October 16th, 2009 at 2:28 PM #
Nevermind the number 3, collaboration, the meaning of science prizes, etc. If a small group of scientists are to be recognized for work on the structure and function of the ribosome today, Harry must be included. You put Harry in first, and then divvy up who else gets it. He really got screwed on this one. Now the burden lies on Tom, Venki, and Ada to make clear the importance of Harry’s contribution in their acceptance speeches in December.
Sean
October 17th, 2009 at 10:38 AM #
@Abhishek: Oh yes, I try to read as many blogs as possible and engage. I am planning on doing a results post about the poll (as usual) and will discuss the results. I will make an extra effort to put in my 2 cents then – can you wait? will you still be around?
—
Hi David, thanks for taking the time to comment.
I hoped some Harry fans would drop by – thanks for the rant/sharing.
Abhishek Tiwari
October 17th, 2009 at 11:43 AM #
Ya sure I will wait for your review, see any cross section of Nobel Prize should be on technical grounds, just because some one feel that Harry Noller was most suitable does not make sense. What you should be really doing is to dig more as crystallographer and come up with a technical comparison of their contributions. I read a lot of articles about this but no one gave me a sound reason for their statement, just gossip.
Sean
October 17th, 2009 at 11:51 AM #
Good point, I tried to include technical information in the post by linking to Hubmed (via published extensively), which is a list of 33 publications, all of which are related to the ribosome.
I will try to do better.
Ribo
October 29th, 2009 at 5:58 PM #
As someone else said “If Noller alone had received the prize, it would not have been as controversial as leaving him out”. Where is that option in the poll?
Sean
October 29th, 2009 at 6:03 PM #
Hi Ribo,
Welcome and thanks for the comment.
Haha, the sidebar is only so big, but note taken
Boldy
November 24th, 2009 at 1:59 PM #
Interesting, did you plan to continue this article?
Thanks
Boldy
Sean
November 24th, 2009 at 5:30 PM #
The results were posted here and a tribute here.
Denis
November 28th, 2009 at 6:01 AM #
In 2004, Murfy and Ramakrishnan reported an experimental confirmation, on the atomic-molecular level, of the existence of the inosine-adenine pair within the ribosome-tRNA-mRNA complex; moreover, the conformation of the pair was exactly the same as predicted by Crick.
From his paper (Murfy and Ramakrishnan 2004): “The modification of adenine to inosine has been found for all the four-codon boxes except tRNAGly—eight tRNAs in higher eukaryotes and seven in yeast, but only tRNA Arg in prokaryotes. In Escherichia coli inosine is present only in tRNA Arg ICG, which is the only tRNA to decode the codons CGU/C/A”
That is, E. coli and many other prokaryotes disprove the wobble hypothesis in direct experiment: they have no inosine in isoleucine tRNA, but isoleucine is encoded by three codons
I’m afraid that Ramacrishnans result was only a mistake or bluff.
truti
December 23rd, 2009 at 2:49 PM #
If Noller is the Rosalind Franklin of our time, then Rosalind Franklin is the GN Ramachandran of her time. GNR’s paper on collagen structure was held up for quite some time by Nature while they waited for Watson-Crick to jury rig up some cockamamie explanation The graceless Watson continues to claim he determined the structure of collagen despite being nowhere in the picture