Every October I wait for the Nobel Prize announcements to come from Stockholm, and the last couple of days witnessed two announcements that happen to pertain to the molecular level of life. The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Drs. Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2009/).

And the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to Drs. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A. Steitz and Ada E. Yonath for the studies of the structure and function of the ribosome (http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2009/).

Hearty congratulations to the Laureates!