nobel prize week, day 3

The Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2009 is jointly awarded to Venkatraman Ramakrishnan (UK), Thomas A. Steitz (USA), and Ada E. Yonath (Israel) "for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome."

From the press release, these breakthroughs may lead to better antibiotics:

Ribosomes produce proteins, which in turn control the chemistry in all living organisms. As ribosomes are crucial to life, they are also a major target for new antibiotics.

This year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry awards Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A. Steitz and Ada E. Yonath for having showed what the ribosome looks like and how it functions at the atomic level. All three have used a method called X-ray crystallography to map the position for each and every one of the hundreds of thousands of atoms that make up the ribosome.

[...]

An understanding of the ribosome's innermost workings is important for a scientific understanding of life. This knowledge can be put to a practical and immediate use; many of today's antibiotics cure various diseases by blocking the function of bacterial ribosomes. Without functional ribosomes, bacteria cannot survive. This is why ribosomes are such an important target for new antibiotics.

Go Science!