The 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry: Directed evolution & phage display - Speaking of Chemistry

Frances Arnold, George Smith, and Gregory Winter won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Watch our latest episode to learn why. ↓↓More information below↓↓
This trio took home chemistry’s top honor for developing techniques, directed evolution and phage display, that identify useful new enzymes, antibodies, and more. We know a lot of chemistry fans were rooting for lithium-ion-battery guru John Goodenough to be tapped for the 2018 prize, but stay with us: We are excited about the impactful chemistry involved this year, and we’re about to break it down for you. Let us know what you think about the award going to directed evolution and phage display in the comments.
Correction: At about 2:30 in the video, we incorrectly refer to Nobel Laureate Gregory Winter as George Winter.
Sources:
Celia Arnaud’s stunning news story on the prize for C&EN:
Frances H. Arnold, George P. Smith, and Gregory P. Winter share 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry | C&EN
cen.acs.org/bi...
Frances Arnold’s work:
Tuning the activity of an enzyme for unusual environments: sequential random mutagenesis of subtilisin E for catalysis in dimethylformamide | Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA
doi.org/10.1073...
George P. Smith’s work:
Filamentous fusion phage: novel expression vectors that display cloned antigens on the virion surface | Science
doi.org/10.1126...
Greg Winter’s work:
Phage antibodies: filamentous phage displaying antibody variable domains | Nature
doi.org/10.1038...
Speaking of Chemistry is a production of Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society.
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[@elaynachin]

It's amazing how scientists and chemist would spend so much effort and time for conducting researches and discover the unknown...There is just so much work! Couldn't agree more that science has been of contribution to society, making life more comfortable and quality.

[@UrChoiceTV]

Yes it's more fascinating about chemistry

[@user-yp5my4uu6s]

It seems that he had already known that the chemistry nobel comes to lithium battery this year.

[@shannondove9029]

How difficult would it be to use this method to get bacteria to produce morphine? Could this work to get an organism to produce a lot more of something it already makes, about a thousand times more? There is a parasite worm that produces morphine in very tiny amounts, if the worm could produce a thousand times more than it already does , then it may be a practical way of farming morphine, far more efficient than growing Poppy's.

[@state_song_xprt]

It's been done in yeast, but not very efficiently science.sciencemag.org/content/349/6252/1095

[@FxPrawisuda]

I am confused, he said that smith's work was to insert the gene of interest, mass produced it (assuming the great variety of phage are expressed), and then plucked it out of the phage pool. Isn't just regular cloning?

[@shadowsfromolliesgraveyard6577]

Could you use directed evolution to develop materials? Like evolve a mycelium for electrical conductivity and see if it produces a material that's a better conductor than copper.

[@FxPrawisuda]

In theory, you could. I always wanted to study to what extent evolution can go.

[@HussinJaafari]

And how that enzyme directed evolution is related to evolution of species. Can anyone explain? I don't know how this is called evolution when you force something into a new universe and while adapting itself to that change. As i understood from all I read, evolution is a big change of our proteins which are directly related to make RNA then DNA....Someone to help me understand this thanks in advance.

[@Russianboyz95]

It's called "directed evolution" because they are controlling the conditions under which it occurs, hence "directed." In nature evolution is completely random.

[@trenicejohnson15]

evolution of species come from mutations changing enzymes so much that they do different things. With directed evolution, we go in and keep adding mutations in a lab until the enzymes do the task that we want it to do. We take something that would take millions of years and do it in less than a week. Here's more information on it sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2018/chemistry-nobel-evolving-proteins-better-medicines-biofuels/

[@rutvin8763]

@@Russianboyz95 No, natural and directed evolution are conceptually very similar. In both cases there are plenty of random mutations in the genome are generated. Then while nature selects the mutant that would best survive in that environment, in directed evolution the scientist selects the mutant that best matches the desired property (e.g. an enzyme that functions normally in a harsher environment).

[@veli1495]

In principle what they did was really the opposite of evolution, I agree. Randomness would on average create zillions of bacteria thatbthe whole universe may not fit before reaching the desired one. They controlled everything from destination point to amounts of mutation and precise places of mutations too. This puts many questions on the validity of evolution as a scientific explanation 🙄

[@thiebes]

Was that last comment a crack about Goodenough?

[@MattDavenportPhD]

It was.

[@AungAung-fb3fl]

ျမန္မာသတင္းအစံု

[@stivjoz476]

Sounds like Gain of Function...

[@brycekalvinchaikin6893]

interesting.... vaccine component perhaps?

[@Madchemist002]

Yeah. Phage display has been used is various vaccines and therapies. I would say it is better than the hybridoma technique. Although, mRNA vaccines will probably see an upsurge now.

[@yashas9974]

3:50 .... and two years later we have lots of women in 2020 winning the nobel prize

[@woonawoona]

his voice keeps cracking lol