Rumor has it that RNA has fallen out of favor politically, presumably as a key molecule for vaccines against Covid, making it an unwelcome symbol to the U.S. administration in the era of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Donald Trump. According to reports, U.S. researchers have been advised to specifically remove references to messenger RNA from research projects competing for public funding.
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It takes two to think

Watson & Crick for the double helix. Doudna & Charpentier for CRISPR. Karikó & Weissman for RNA vaccines… Do two people think better than one or even many? Itai Yanai and Martin J. Lercher suggest so in Nature Biotechnology.
Continue readingA must-read recommended by Doudna, Gates and…

The Italian publisher did me the crazy honor of including a quote from me on the back cover of the best book of the year (IMHO), along with quotes from CRISPR inventor Jennifer Doudna and Bill Gates. The autobiography of Katalin Karikó, the mRNA vaccine scientist, is a must-read for those who love great science and great minds. We had already blogged about her in the aftermath of the Nobel Prize.
A beautiful Nobel that should not be repeated

Drew Weissman will forgive us, but this will go down in history mostly as Katalin Karikó’s Nobel Prize. And perhaps in addition to being an award to celebrate, it is also an award that should make us angry. Because this scientist’s story is too extraordinary, for all the obstacles she had to face and overcome. It is always said that girls need model female scientists to inspire them, Karikó is a beautiful role model but we sincerely hope that she does not have to be an example to anyone, because it is not fair that a researcher of this stature was forced into precariousness for decades and could not count on a stable professorship in the United States where she moved from Hungary in the 1980s (at the University of Pennsylvania she results “adjunct professor”).
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