On Oct. 5, 2009, Elizabeth H. Blackburn won a share of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2009 for discovering how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase.

In 1980, Blackburn discovered that telomeres have a particular DNA, and two years later together with Jack Szostak, she further proved that this DNA prevents chromosomes from being broken down. Elizabeth Blackburn and Carol Greider discovered the enzyme telomerase, which produces the telomeres’ DNA, in 1984.