A revolutionary new technique, based on messengerRNA, has led to the development of innovative COVID-19 vaccines that have benefitted lakhs of people worldwide. It was widely expected that the technique would be recognised for a Nobel Prize this year. Its omission has caused worldwide disappointment. As the importance of the technique is increasingly realised, it is hoped that justice would be done and the best contributors honoured in the near future.
When I first described* messengerRNA as a re-engineered biological wonder, little did I realise that it would protect thousands of people worldwide from COVID-19 in a short time. I was glad to see mRNA become a game changer in our fight against the pandemic within a few months of its application.
Tracing the origin of the use of mRNA, one recalls that in 1988, a graduate student, Robert Malone, from the Salk Institute in California, did an experiment, which showed that mRNA....
