It’s amazing what a Nobel Prize can do for you. It gives you a voice, access to powerful people, and a chance to actually be heard. UMass’s Craig Mello has taken full advantage of his new-found fame. He wrote a letter late last year to President George Bush about the promise of RNAi and the benefits of NIH-funded biomedical research in the US.

He also wrote a letter to Massaschusetts Governor Deval Patrick about why a RNAi research center should be formed at UMass Medical School (where Mello is based). Unlike Bush, it looks like Patrick took Mello’s letter to heart. The RNAi center at UMass is a major part of Patrick’s $1 billion life sciences plan for the state.

The next batch of Nobel prize winners will be announced in just a couple of months so Mello will soon no longer be featured quite so prominently in the limelight.

By the way, has there been any study of what has happened to scientists after they won a Nobel? How many and which ones use their Nobel for advocacy/political change vs how many/which ones quietly go back to the lab and continue with their work?