As a child, Mario Capecchi spent four years on the streets in his native Italy, surviving by stealing or begging for food. Today, he's one of three scientists--the other two are Oliver Smithies and Sir Martin Evans--who've won the Nobel prize for medicine, recognition for their collective work on gene targeting, a process that allows researchers to turn genes off and on in mice. Their work involved introducing a genetic alteration in embryonic stem cells which are then injected into a mouse embryo. That development has spurred a huge advance in understanding the role of genes and health--and advanced a myriad number of therapeutic programs.
- see the release from the Nobel Assembly
- read the article from the New York Times
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