Women Scientists Bag Nobel Prize in Chemistry for Discovery of 'Genetic Scissors'

Two women scientists, Emmanuelle Charpentier and Jennifer A. Doudna have bagged the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for developing 'CRISPR/Cas9 genetic scissors'. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences while announcing the winners, stated that the technology created a revolutionary impact on the life sciences that is contributing to new cancer therapies and may make the dream of curing inherited diseases come true. Charpentier is a French scientist who is currently the director of Max Planck Unit for the Science of Pathogens in Berlin and Doudna is an American who is a professor at University of California. The secretary of the Academy Göran K. Hansson stated that the Nobel Lectures and the award ceremony for the 2020 Nobel Prizes will be conducted online owing to the COVID-19 pandemic.