The “Houska“ Prize, awarded annually by the B&C Foundation, is Austria´s biggest private award for applied research. Dr. Michael Nodine, Gregor Mendel Institute of Molecular Plant Biology (GMI), was nominated for his work on the development of methods for nucleic acid quantification. A major issue they encountered was the lack of absolute quantification of small RNA levels, making the comparison between tissues difficult. To overcome this problem, Michael and his team, developed a set of synthetic small RNA Spike-Ins that could be added to these tissue samples. This technology allows us to accurately quantify the levels of different small RNAs that could play a role in several human diseases, ranging from cancer to cardiovascular disease. In 2019, GMI [...]