For years it was thought that a large part of the genome was useless. All sequences that did not contain instructions for making proteins were called "junk DNA." Today, however, we know that this statement was not only hasty, but also completely wrong. Because in the non-coding genome it plays key functions for life.
This is being demonstrated by scientists such as Maite Huarte, director of the DNA and RNA Medicine Division and principal investigator of the Non-Coding RNA and Cancer Genome Group at the CIMA University of Navarra, who has just been awarded the XXXI Carmen and Severo Ochoa Prize for Research in Molecular Biology precisely for her contributions "to the knowledge of the mechanisms that regulate the activity of our genes."
"Far from being garbage, there is more and more evidence that the non-coding genome is fundamental and has a key role in the function and regulation of our genome and the normal function of our cells and tissues," says Huarte, a graduate in Biological Sciences from the University of Navarra, a doctor from the Autonomous University of Madrid and a passion for Molecular Biology and Genetics since her high school years where she already understood that what she wanted to dedicate herself to was "understanding the bases of life."
The prize, awarded by the Carmen and Severo Ochoa Foundation with the collaboration of the AstraZeneca Foundation and the madri+d Foundation for Knowledge, especially recognizes the career of the researcher - who completed her training at Harvard and the Broad Institute of MIT in the USA - and values "the originality of her scientific approaches and her contribution to the development of new lines of research in a field that has undergone a profound transformation in recent decades."
Huarte has been a pioneer in demonstrating the role of non-coding RNA in the functioning of cells, "opening new avenues to understand the molecular bases of different pathologies, with special orientation towards the study of cancer."
The scientist has focused on the so-called long non-coding RNA molecules (lncRNAs) that, despite not encoding proteins, regulate the functions of the genome and gene expression, and when altered play a key role in diseases such as cancer.
"Our goal is, on the one hand, to understand the mechanisms that make these IncRNAs influence the regulation and expression of the cells' genome and how they contribute, when altered, to the growth of tumor cells," says Huarte, who then adds that he also wants to develop ways to inhibit this effect that contributes to the expansion of cancer. "We want to develop a strategy that can be used in the future as a cancer therapy," he advances. Her research combines the application of genomics, epigenomics and molecular biology techniques with the analysis of patient samples and has a special interest in colorectal and ovarian cancer.
The researcher is convinced of the "enormous therapeutic potential of RNA", a molecule that for years has been considered 'the poor sister' of DNA, a mere transcriber of genetic information and which is being revealed as a true Swiss army knife of applications.
The messenger RNA vaccines that were developed in record time against the Covid-19 pandemic were the spigot that opens "a range of possibilities for other types of treatments that can help us cure other types of diseases." Different molecules can have a clinical application, predicts the scientist who emphasizes that "these strategies have a lot of potential that we have to explore."
Huarte claims the importance of betting on basic science, on research that is not only focused on direct translation to the patient. "I always keep in mind Louis Pasteur's phrase, which said that 'applied sciences do not exist, only the applications of science,'" he emphasizes.
"If there is no basic science, which is what explores new fields and makes new discoveries, we would have nothing with which to develop new medications or approaches to diagnose and treat diseases. That is why I think it is something that must be supported and promoted without a doubt," he says.
Thanks to many basic science discoveries, giant steps have been taken in Medicine in recent years, continues the scientist, who sees new and important advances in the field of Genetics on the nearest horizon.
"It is already being used for the diagnosis of multiple diseases, because they can be associated with specific mutations in the genome. But we are also going to see many advances in the development of treatments and gene therapies," he predicts. "If we understand what alterations exist in our genes, we can find strategies to modify these alterations. That is already a reality and a field with enormous growth."
The challenge for the future is to make these therapies increasingly efficient and cheaper, he acknowledges.
The scientist feels "very happy and honored" to receive an award that bears the name of Severo Ochoa, the greatest exponent that we have in Spain of Molecular Biology and someone who contributed widely to understanding the bases of life."
