[jonplackett]

Both are based on the work of one scientist Katalin Karikó

She had a pretty tough time getting her work accepted at the time - no one would fund it, she got demoted, everyone said it wouldn’t work etc - as is the way with all genuinely new ideas!

This is a really good write up - her story starts about half way in.

https://www.statnews.com/2020/11/10/the-story-of-mrna-how-a-...

[eliaspro]

It actually goes back even further to Ingmar Hoerr (who went on to found CureVac, producing now a temperature stable SARS-COV2 vaccine) who accidentally discovered that RNA can be stabilized using liposomes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingmar_Hoerr

https://www.nzz.ch/wirtschaft/curevac-gruender-und-mrna-pion...