NEW YORK, Sept. 14 (UPI) -- Five pioneering scientists from the United States, Japan and England have been awarded this year's Lasker prizes for medical research.

The awards were announced Saturday by the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation for the support of biomedical research, The New York Times reported Sunday.

Akira Endo of Japan was lauded for discovering cholesterol-lowering statin drugs while American microbiologist Stanley Falkow of Stanford University was honored for expanding knowledge of disease-causing microbes, the Times reported.

A third award went to two American scientists and a British scientist for their work on the previously unknown universe of potent molecules, tiny ribonucleic acids known as micro-RNAs. They are Victor R. Ambros of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Gary B. Ruvkun of Massachusetts General Hospital and David C. Baulcombe of the University of Cambridge.

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