Katalin Karikó

thumb|Katalin Karikó in 2020 Katalin Karikó (born 17 January 1955) is a Hungarian biochemist who specializes in RNA-mediated mechanisms. This technology has been licensed by BioNTech and Moderna to develop their COVID-19 vaccines. For their collaborative research, Karikô and Drew Weissman shared the 2021 Lasker–DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award and the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. Quotes Every night I was working: grant, grant, grant. And it came back always no, no, no. "The story of mRNA: How a once-dismissed idea became a leading technology in the Covid vaccine race" The idea was to give our cells, thanks to messenger Rna (mRna), the instructions to produce proteins capable of curing diseases. ... with RNA he can make his cells produce that protein continuously for 2-3 days and everything is resolved. " La pioniera di BioNTech: “Con la mia arma anti-Covid ora voglio battere il cancro”" With mRna I can get my muscle cells to start producing Epo. And even if Epo degrades after two hours and mRna degrades after five days, once you have produced red blood cells they last up to three hundred days. I'm working on an anticancer idea: injecting an mRna into the tumor that prompts the cancer cells to do something that gets the attention of the immune system: release cytokines. It's like saying to the immune cells, "Come here! Come here!". " La pioniera di BioNTech: “Con la mia arma anti-Covid ora voglio battere il cancro”" In the American university system you are not salaried: you have to bring the funding for your research, winning scholarships. I kept trying, but my questions were turned down. My research colleagues understood that I was working on interesting things and they subsidized me until the beautiful age of 58. I left the University of Pennsylvania after 24 years of work, without ever having had a proposal for a professorship or a permanent contract. " La pioniera di BioNTech: “Con la mia arma anti-Covid ora voglio battere il cancro”" I have to say that I expected that the vaccines would work. BioNTech signed an agreement with Pfizer in 2018 to develop an Messenger RNA mRNA-based influenza vaccine. And by end of 2019 we had already seen the results of animal trials. We were ready for the Human subject research human trial with the Nucleoside-modified messenger RNA nucleoside-modified mRNA. So in 2020 we just had to change the template so the generated mRNA coded for coronavirus-specific protein. Considering all the prior results, I expected that this new vaccine would work.What I did not expect was that I would be recognized. as quoted by Sara Frueh in: “You Learn More From Failure—When Things Are Not Working Well.” Issues in Science and Technology 41 1 Fall 2024 40–43 https://issues.org/interview-katalin-kariko/ 10.58875/SLYO4086 Science is fun, to be a scientist, this is a fun job. What is exciting is that there is a complexity, and then it is you who can solve it by reading articles or doing experiments and put together things which maybe nobody did. Then you realise what’s going on. The joy that you were the first one to know that this is how things happens. Transcript from an interview with Katalin Karikó 9 August 2026 nobelprize.org https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2023/kariko/217971-interview-transcript/ Quotes about Katalina Karikó She took summer science classes, became a biology student at University of Szeged Szeged University and eventually obtained a PhD there. Aged 22, she fell in love with Béla Francia, a trainee mechanic five years her junior. They married, and in 1982 Karikó gave birth to their daughter, Susan. Two years later they moved to the US with their entire savings – about £900 – that were sewn inside Susan’s teddy bear to avoid Hungary’s currency restrictions.By this time, Karikó had become obsessed with Messenger RNA messenger RNA (mRNA), the material responsible for translating our DNA into proteins, the molecules from which we are constructed. Crucially, mRNA is extremely difficult to work with because it is fragile and short-lived. But Karikó was convinced it could play a major role in medicine and constantly fought for it to be a research focus. Few colleagues agreed, dubbing her “the crazy mRNA lady”. Robin McKie, 11 February 2024 The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/feb/11/breaking-through-my-life-in-science-by-katalin-kariko-review-real-life-lessons-in-chemistry Review of Breaking Through: My Life in Science by Katalin Karikó — real-life lessons in chemistry. This vivid account of the Hungarian biochemist who endured decades of derision before pioneering Pfizer’s Covid vaccine is a tribute to her tenacity and self-belief. External links Katalin Karikó, University of Szeged National Academy of Sciences https://www.nasonline.org/directory-entry/katalin-kariko-44rksj/ Category:Biochemists Category:Women academics from Hungary Category:1955 births Category:Living people Category:Women scientists from Hungary Category:Immigrants to the United States Category:Women born in the 1950s Category:Nobel laureates in Physiology or Medicine Category:Nobel laureates from Hungary Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Category:Women Nobel laureates