(CNN)Mourners held a heavenly birthday memorial Sunday for Victoria Martens, the 10-year-old New Mexico girl who Albuquerque police say was raped by her mother's boyfriend and then killed while her mother watched.
RNA interference (RNAi) is a natural process that cells use to 'turn off' or silence unwanted or harmful genes. The initial discovery of this phenomenon was in 1991, by scientists trying to deepen the colour of petunias. Surprisingly, by introducing a gene for colour, they found that they had turned off the gene.
RICHARD JORGENSEN: And because there's no purple pigment produced, the flowers will be white. ROBERT KRULWICH: And that's how Rich and his petunias helped discover what we now call RNAi. ERIC LANDER: RNAi means RNA interference, because the Cop is interfering with RNA messages, with the recipes in the cell. ROBERT KRULWICH: And when scientists realized that every plant and animal cell has RNAiâa way to turn off the recipes, turn off genesâthey thought, Hmm, maybe we can use these Cops to work for us..