2NDLD NOBEL 2 LST

After his graduation in Physics from Baroda University
in 1971, Ramakrishnan left for the US where he did his Ph D in
the same subject from Ohio University in 1976 and has been
associated with the Cambridge University for the past 14
years.

As a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University, he worked
on a neutron-scattering map of the small ribosomal subunit of
E Coli. He has been studying ribosome structure ever since.

"The MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and the
University of Utah supported this work (on ribosome) and the
collegiate atmosphere there made it all possible,"
Ramakrishnan said.

"The idea of supporting long term basic research like
that at LMB does lead to breakthroughs, the ribosome is
already starting to show its medical importance," he said.

The Academy, in its citation, said 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.

Ramakrishnan is currently a senior scientist and
group leader at the Structural Studies Division of the MRC
Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England.

Steitz, a 69-year-old, is a professor of molecular
biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University.

Yonath is a professor of structural biology at the
Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel, and the
ninth Israeli to win a Nobel prize. PTI