Communication is key to civilisation.
It is even the basis of our very existence.
Biochemist Roger Kornberg caught this playing out in a molecular moment that created history. And bagged him the 2006 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
Much like passing down genetic code, it runs in the family.
His father, Arthur Kornberg, won the 1959 Nobel Prize in Medicine, for how chemical “blocks” of genetic code are put together into the double helix. Our DNA, master molecule of heredity.
Four decades later, his son had captured – in atomic detail – how the genetic information in these chemical blocks is “read” and duplicated. How an enzyme binds to the double helix, unzips it, and copies certain blocks. A process called transcription. It is this copied code – or messenger RNA – that ferries across the waters of the cell and beyond to pass on genetic instructions to protein-making machines. Which in turn churn out the building blocks of our bodies. And keep us alive and functioning.
It was no easy feat, capturing this intricate work from DNA to RNA at such a miniscule scale. (It was coincidentally the work of another father-son Nobel Prize winning duo, William Henry Bragg and William Lawrence Brag, who used X-rays to study crystals, which helped Kornberg in his mission to literally cast light on transcription, frame by frame.)
Why was this a breakthrough moment? Because it capped a decades-long quest. Because it is this replication process – caught in these high-precision snapshots – that manifests as healthy organs. And because if there are errors in this process, then our bodies face disease. Cancer, heart disease, inflammation.
To think that at 9, all Roger wanted for Christmas was a week in the lab.
The work of this father-son duo – one of only 6 in the world to have won the Nobel – has become part of the bible for studying genes. The basis for how we are gradually grasping the power to play with nature’s grand design. Developing therapies, enhancing immunity. Even engineering our future. Gene-editing tools like CRISPR are simply editing out “typos” in our genetic text. mRNA vaccines are radically redefining healthcare.
But Korberg isn’t done yet.
At 76, he’s creating an experimental drug for COVID-19. Working with a disruptive AI biopharma company that’s making human-on-chip models of organs. New frontiers, to cut down costs, fast-track R&D, phase out animal testing. As he’s said, “there's little doubt that the most important work – and therefore the most significant discoveries – lie ahead.”
Prioritising prevention over cure is at the heart of this biochemist’s work. At SYNAPSE, Roger Kornberg will field the big questions. What’s next for human health? Where are diseases, diagnosis, and drugs headed? What role will new tech play – RNA therapies, quantum computation? And how the field of genomics will unfold, in a bionic world.
*Due to unforeseen, personal circumstances, Dr Roger Kornberg could not participate in SYNAPSE 2024.