Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded for ‘genetic scissors’ discovery

Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded for ‘genetic scissors’ discovery

Chemical scientists Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A. Doudna were awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry on Wednesday, becoming only the sixth and seventh women ever to win the award in over a century.The pair's research concerned "the development of a method for genome editing." Charpentier of France currently works in Germany and Doudna, an American, discovered the CRISPR-Cas9 "genetic scissors" in 2012, a breakthrough that "has taken the life sciences into a new epoch," the Nobel Committee said."This year's prize is about rewriting the code of life," the committee said. The tool the scientists developed can be used to change the DNA of animals, plants and microorganisms with extremely high precision.Charpentier is head of the Max Planck Insitute for the Science of Pathogens in Germany. Doudna is a professor at