Carol W. Greider facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Carol W. Greider
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Greider in 2021
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Carolyn Widney Greider
April 15, 1961 San Diego, California, U.S.
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| Education | University of California, Santa Barbara (BA) University of Göttingen University of California, Berkeley (PhD) |
| Known for | Discovery of telomerase |
| Spouse(s) |
Nathaniel C. Comfort
(m. 1993; div. 2011) |
| Children | 2 |
| Awards | Richard Lounsbery Award (2003) Lasker Award (2006) Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize (2007) Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (2009) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Molecular biology |
| Institutions | Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Johns Hopkins School of Medicine University of California, Santa Cruz |
| Thesis | Identification of a specific telomere terminal transferase activity in Tetrahymena extracts (1985) |
| Doctoral advisor | Elizabeth Blackburn |
| Other academic advisors | Beatrice M. Sweeney David J. Asai Leslie Wilson |
Carolyn Widney Greider (born April 15, 1961) is an American scientist who studies molecular biology. This field looks at how tiny parts of cells, like DNA, work. She is a top professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
In 1984, while still a student, Dr. Greider made a huge discovery. She found an important enzyme called telomerase. This enzyme helps protect the ends of our chromosomes, which are like tiny packages of DNA in our cells. Without telomerase, these ends, called telomeres, get shorter and shorter. This can cause cells to age too fast or even lead to problems like cancer. For this amazing discovery, she won the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. She shared the prize with her mentor, Elizabeth Blackburn, and another scientist, Jack W. Szostak.
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Early Life and Education
Carol Greider was born in San Diego, California. Her father was a physics professor. Her family later moved to Davis, California. She finished high school there in 1979. She then went to the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 1983, she earned her degree in biology. She also spent some time studying in Germany at the University of Göttingen.
Carol Greider has dyslexia, which means she sometimes has trouble with reading and spelling. She realized this in first grade. To overcome it, she learned to memorize words instead of sounding them out. She believes her dyslexia actually helped her as a scientist. It taught her to think differently and connect many ideas at once. This helped her make unique choices, like studying a special organism called Tetrahymena.
Because of her dyslexia, Carol had low scores on some tests for graduate school. She applied to many schools but was only accepted by two. She chose to study at the University of California, Berkeley.
Discovery of Telomerase
Carol Greider earned her Ph.D. in molecular biology from Berkeley in 1987. She worked with her professor, Elizabeth Blackburn. Together, they found out how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase.
In April 1984, Carol joined Dr. Blackburn's lab. She was looking for an enzyme that adds special DNA bases to the ends of chromosomes. Without these extra bases, chromosomes get shorter each time a cell divides. This can cause cells to wear out or lead to serious health issues.
They decided to look for this enzyme in a tiny freshwater organism. It's called Tetrahymena thermophila. This organism was perfect because it has many telomeres.
On Christmas Day in 1984, Carol found something exciting. Her experiments showed that a specific enzyme was likely doing the job. After six more months of hard work, Carol and Dr. Blackburn were sure. This enzyme was indeed responsible for adding to telomeres. They shared their discovery in a science journal in December 1985. The enzyme was first called "telomere terminal transferase." Now, we know it as telomerase. Telomerase helps rebuild the ends of chromosomes. It also plays a role in how long cells can live.
Carol then did more research to confirm her discovery. She wanted to know how telomerase worked. She found that a type of RNA was involved in the enzyme's function.
Later Career and Research
After her Ph.D., Carol Greider started her own lab. She worked at the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York. She kept studying Tetrahymena telomerase. She found the gene that makes its RNA part. She also showed how telomerase works to add the telomere repeats.
She also worked with another scientist, Calvin Harley. They showed that when telomeres get short, cells start to age. To learn more, they studied telomerase in mice and humans.
Carol Greider also created the first "telomerase knockout mouse." This means she made mice that couldn't produce telomerase. These mice showed that telomerase is not needed to be born. But, as their telomeres got shorter, the mice developed problems. These problems were like early aging.
In 1997, Carol Greider moved to the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She continued to study mice without telomerase. She found that after several generations, these mice became unable to have babies. But, if they mated with normal mice, their telomeres could grow back.
She also kept studying how telomerase works at a tiny level. Her work helped us understand how telomeres and telomerase are linked to diseases.
In 2006, Carol Greider, Elizabeth Blackburn, and Jack Szostak won the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research. This is a very important award in medical science. Then, in 2009, they received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
In 2014, she became a special professor at Johns Hopkins University. As of 2021, she is a Distinguished Professor at UC Santa Cruz.
Dr. Greider's lab today continues to research telomeres. They want to understand how telomere biology connects to diseases. Her lab uses different methods, including studying yeast and mice. They are also looking into how short telomeres might affect tumors. Their future work will focus on how telomeres are controlled and how they grow longer.
Personal Life
Carol Greider married Nathaniel C. Comfort in 1992. He is also an academic. They divorced in 2011. She has two children.
Awards and Honors
- Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences (1990–1994)
- Gairdner Foundation International Award (1998)
- Rosenstiel Award in Basic Medical Research (1998)
- Passano Foundation Award (1999)
- Academy of Achievement Golden Plate Award (2000)
- Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2003)
- Member of the National Academy of Sciences (2003)
- Richard Lounsbery Award (2003)
- Lila Gruber Cancer Research Award (2006)
- Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research (2006)
- Wiley Prize in Biomedical Sciences (2006)
- Dickson Prize in Medicine (2007)
- Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize of Columbia University (2007)
- The Pearl Meister Greengard Prize (2008)
- Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (2009)
- Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize (2009)
- Member of the Institute of Medicine (2010)
- Member, American Philosophical Society (2016)
- Pinnacle Award (2019), Association for Women in Science
- Award for Excellence in Molecular Diagnostics, Association for Molecular Pathology (2022)
See also
In Spanish: Carol Greider para niños
- List of female Nobel laureates
- List of RNA biologists
- History of RNA biology
- Timeline of women in science
