GEN-Thermo_Oct22_MakingThePromiseOf - 8

What's Next for mRNA Vaccines?
What's Next for mRNA Vaccines?
I think it's important
to realize that there
are few limits. Whether
it's mRNA vaccines or
anything else, I always
tell my students to
dream big dreams,
dreams that can change
the world.
Robert Langer, ScD, is the David H. Koch Institute
professor at MIT and a co-founder of Moderna, the
pharmaceutical company behind a COVID-19 mRNA
vaccine. In this Q&A, he tells us about the present and
future of these versatile vaccines.
GEN: The technology behind mRNA vaccines has been
available for decades, but it was only with the pandemic
that we first saw a publicly available mRNA vaccine. Why
didn't this happen sooner?
Langer: While it is true that over the last thirty years
hundreds of scientists have worked on developing
mRNA vaccines and therapeutics, real breakthroughs
in making an effective and commercially viable mRNA
vaccine were greatly accelerated by the COVID-19
pandemic. It's important to realize that Moderna and
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others like BioNtech and Curevac were in clinical trials for
multiple different vaccines and therapeutics at the time
the COVID-19 crisis started in late 2019/early 2020.
In fact, Moderna had eight vaccines (including a
personalized cancer vaccine, a vaccine against Zika
virus, and a dual vaccine against metapneumovirus
and a type of parainfluenza) in human clinical trials
at that point. Moderna recognized the incredible
and unique opportunity to quickly meet the global
demand for a COVID-19 vaccine by leveraging our
mRNA tools and technologies. All the necessary
pieces were in place, such as the correct mRNA
chemistry and the development of nanoparticles to
protect the messenger RNA (this actually had part
of its origins in our MIT lab for which I received the
Millennium Technology Prize in 2008). So the orga

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GEN-Thermo_Oct22_MakingThePromiseOf

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