Jane Goodall
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Photo: Christopher Michel, 2024, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; cropped and downscaled from the original · Wikimedia Commons, 'Katalin Karikó in 2024 by Christopher Michel 02.jpg' -- photograph by Christopher Michel, taken 16 September 2024, uploaded by the photographer (Commons account Cmichel67) on 17 September 2024 as own work under CC BY-SA 4.0; original JPEG 4569 x 6850 pixels (about 19.6 MB, Canon EOS R5 Mark II metadata). Black-and-white portrait. A 3:4 region (3969 x 5292 pixels) around her head and torso was cropped from the original and downscaled once to 900 x 1200 (never upscaled). · CC BY-SA 4.0
biologist · Contemporary
Katalin Karikó
b. 1955
Known For
scientificmedicalinnovation
Not yet included in personality matching — the documented evidence doesn't yet cover enough of the personality model. Everything else on this page is fully available.
Trait Constellation
Key Achievements
With the immunologist Drew Weissman, Karikó showed that replacing a standard building block of synthetic mRNA with a modified nucleoside such as pseudouridine greatly reduces the inflammatory response it provokes. Their 2005 paper was followed in 2008 and 2010 by studies showing that such modifications also raise protein production, which the Nobel Committee says removed critical obstacles to clinical uses of mRNA.
The two mRNA COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna were built on this nucleoside-modified mRNA and were first approved in December 2020, with protective effects of around 95 percent reported. For the discoveries that enabled them, Karikó shared the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Weissman, two years after the pair received the 2021 Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award.
She pursued mRNA as a medicine for decades. At the University of Pennsylvania, where she worked from 1989 to 2013, she kept developing it despite difficulty convincing research funders, according to the Nobel Committee, and in 2013 she moved to BioNTech in Germany, whose partnership with Pfizer produced one of the first two approved mRNA COVID-19 vaccines.
Moments That Reveal Them
To find out why lab-made mRNA triggered inflammation, Karikó and Weissman first compared RNAs from different sources: bacterial RNA caused a strong reaction in dendritic cells, mammalian RNA a mild one, and mammalian transfer RNA none. Because transfer RNA is rich in modified nucleosides, they then built a set of mRNAs each carrying one modified nucleoside and tested them on dendritic cells, measuring maturation and the activation of two RNA sensors. The sequence of experiments is described by the Lasker Foundation.
This is consistent with a stepwise, comparison-based way of testing an explanation. Analytical Rigour
In the mid-1990s Karikó was moved off the tenure track at Penn into a newly created senior research investigator post, and STAT's Stuart Buck writes that this followed her never winning an NIH grant for the mRNA work. According to the Penn Gazette she joined a neurosurgery lab in 1997 and kept publishing, including a 1999 paper in which she used urokinase receptor proteins to show that in vitro transcribed mRNA could be strongly expressed in living cells.
This is consistent with continuing a research programme through institutional setbacks. Persistence
Turning Points
In 1997 Karikó met Drew Weissman, a newly arrived immunologist at Penn, while both were waiting to use a photocopier. According to the Lasker Foundation she offered to make the mRNA he needed for HIV-vaccine experiments and he accepted, beginning the collaboration that led to the 2005 nucleoside-modification paper; Weissman later said they spent more than twenty years working together.
This is consistent with seeking out collaborators with complementary expertise and offering her own technical skill. Collaboration
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Sources
- Katalin Karikó (Q88608397) -- verified live via the Wikidata API (2026-10-15): English label 'Katalin Karikó', description 'Hungarian biochemist', Hungarian and Korean labels present, instance of human, born 17 January 1955 in Szolnok, no date of death, citizenship Hungary and the United States, occupations including biochemist, researcher, university teacher and inventor; a name search for the person returns only this entity. Orientation only; not used as support for any row.
- The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet, press release for the 2023 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, 2 October 2023 (with the laureates' short biographies) -- CANONICAL SIGNIFICANCE SOURCE: the prize to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman 'for their discoveries concerning nucleoside base modifications that enabled the development of effective mRNA vaccines against COVID-19'; the committee's account that Karikó, 'devoted to developing methods to use mRNA for therapy', stayed true to her vision despite difficulties in convincing research funders, that the two noticed dendritic cells react to in vitro transcribed mRNA and tested mRNA variants with modified bases (inflammation 'almost abolished'), the 2005 paper and the 2008 and 2010 studies showing increased protein production, the two base-modified mRNA vaccines approved in December 2020; and her career facts (born 1955 in Szolnok, PhD at Szeged in 1982, postdoctoral work in Szeged, at Temple University and in Bethesda, at Penn from 1989 to 2013, then BioNTech, since 2021 professor at Szeged and adjunct professor at Penn). Award-body citation, honouring in tone. Read in full.
- Nobel Prize Outreach, 'Katalin Karikó' (Women who changed science series; undated feature referring to 2020-2024) -- the Nobel organisation's popular profile: grants and mistrust at Penn, a demotion after which she persisted, her late-1990s meeting with Drew Weissman at a photocopier, the discouraging first mouse experiments with inflammatory responses, the 2005 discovery, her 2013 move to BioNTech, and her use of prize money to support RNA research at Szeged. Much of the page is family, early-life and political-context material and her own recollections of her departure from Penn, none of which was used; only the professional chronology was used, and only as a secondary check. Read in full.
- Evelyn Strauss for the Lasker Foundation, 'Modified mRNA vaccines' (2021 Lasker~DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award to Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman: citation, the Foundation's account of the work and the laureates' acceptance remarks) -- award-body narrative: Karikó's commitment to mRNA therapeutics from her undergraduate years, steady funding rejections and lack of institutional support through the 1990s, the 1997 photocopier meeting and her offer to make mRNA for Weissman's HIV experiments, the discovery that mRNA by itself matured dendritic cells and the decision to find how to avoid the immune activation, the experiments with RNAs from different sources and with a collection of modified nucleosides (2005), pseudouridine and protein output (2008), the chromatographic purification step, the 2012 erythropoietin tests in mice and monkeys, the move to BioNTech in 2013 and the continued work at a distance, and the 2010 stem-cell paper that finally drew notice. Detailed and specific, honouring in tone; the laureates' own remarks at the end are self and were not used as support. Read in full.
- Andrew Joseph and Deborah Balthazar, '2023 Nobel Prize in Medicine: Karikó, Weissman awarded prize for mRNA research', STAT, 2 October 2023 -- news report: the two researchers' complementary expertise as the Nobel committee framed it, Karikó's 'rejection after rejection in the 1990s while applying for grants' and demotion at Penn, the 2005 discovery, how it 'did not gain wide attention' but caught the attention of the scientists who went on to found Moderna and BioNTech, and her present posts at Szeged and Penn. Her quoted recollections of the demotion and her advice to students are self and were not used. Independent journalism, sympathetic. Read in full.
- Stuart Buck (executive director of the Good Science Project), 'The Karikó problem: Lessons for funding basic research', STAT First Opinion, 1 February 2022 -- opinion essay on science funding that summarises her record: a non-tenure-track research post at Penn, demotion in 1995 because she never won an NIH grant for her mRNA research, a former colleague's remark that her history was told 'as a cautionary tale for young scientists', the copy-machine meeting with Weissman, and the 2005 paper being 'summarily rejected' by Nature and Science (Nature calling it an 'incremental contribution'). Policy writer's argument, used only for the factual summary. Read in full.
- Catherine Offord and Jon Cohen, 'mRNA discovery that paved way for COVID-19 vaccines wins Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine', Science, 2 October 2023 -- science-news report: the 2005 Immunity paper (replacing uridine with modified bases such as pseudouridine reduced the inflammatory response) and the 2008 follow-up on protein output, the first regulatory authorisations of mRNA vaccines in December 2020, Karikó telling Science that in the early 2000s she had no research team and did the biochemistry with her own hands, comments by Anthony Fauci ('doggedly kept at it'), by the oncologist Jessica Foster, who has worked with her, and by the Nobel Assembly's Thomas Perlmann that she 'never received an R01' grant from the NIH. Independent reporting with named colleagues and officials, admiring. Read in full.
- Megan Zahneis, 'Katalin Karikó has thoughts on how to support shunned scholars like her', The Chronicle of Higher Education, 5-6 October 2023 (print issue of 27 October 2023) -- interview-based report: the account of her demotion and pay cut at Penn for lack of grants, the 'incremental contribution' verdict on the 2005 paper, her view that blame is 'twisted' and that funding and publishing systems reward fashionable work, the two Penn colleagues who supported her (a cardiologist who paid her salary for seven years when grants were rejected and a neurosurgery resident who helped secure her a post), and her proposal for formalised institutional support for unconventional scholars. Her remarks on recognition are self; the account of a department chair's pressure over publications and grants is an employment dispute and was not used. Independent reporting. Read in full.
- Penn Today (University of Pennsylvania), 'A wrong number, a cryptic message, and a big Nobel win', 2 October 2023 -- the university's report of the prize announcement and press conference: the chance meeting in the late 1990s while photocopying papers, the 2005 discovery, the report that Weissman noted they 'stayed focused and kept working, despite not getting funding, not getting published, and failing to persuade others that mRNA was interesting and viable', his remark that 'we spent the rest of those 20-plus years working together', and the university leaders' praise. Institutional news item, admiring (the promotional adjectives of the university's president and dean were not used). Read in full.
- Matthew De George, 'The Vaccine Trenches', The Pennsylvania Gazette, May | June 2021 (cover feature, read from the magazine's PDF) -- alumni-magazine feature with interviews: her work at the bench 'never above doing the unglamorous work' even as a vice president, how her former supervisor Elliot Barnathan hired her in 1989 and describes her as 'incredibly inquisitive' and a voracious reader, her reputation as 'the RNA hassler' for offering to make RNA for colleagues, the mid-1990s move off the tenure track into a newly created senior research investigator post, the neurosurgery lab and the 1999 paper she kept publishing, the photocopier meeting with Weissman, grants and investors that did not materialise, the 2004-2005 work on nucleosides and the patent, Barnathan's 'patchwork quilt' description of her method, and Weissman's 'We never gave up'. Skims over the Pfizer chief medical officer sidebar and the vaccine-policy passages, which were not used. Independent feature journalism with named colleagues, admiring. Read in full.
- Flora Lichtman, 'The Leap: I Was Considered A Nobody' (Science Friday in partnership with the Hypothesis Fund; audio profile with transcript), 12 May 2025 -- produced radio profile whose only used material is the first-hand recollection of the neurosurgeon David Langer, who worked with her as a student: that she was 'crazy about cleaning all the glassware' and taught him how to rinse a beaker properly, and his description of how she handled disconfirming data. The segment's family, early-life and immigration passages, the narrator's speculation that her focus on truth explains her demotion and departure from Penn, a colleague's characterisations of her conduct towards senior figures, and her own recollections of the dispute were not used (personality inference from an employment dispute and private life). Audio profile with one named colleague, admiring and promotional in framing. Read in full.
- Wikimedia Commons file page 'Katalin Karikó in 2024 by Christopher Michel 02.jpg' -- checked for the portrait's file and licence: description 'Katalin Karikó in 2024', taken 16 September 2024 (12:10), source 'own work' and author 'Creator:Christopher Michel' (the photographer's Commons account Cmichel67 uploaded it on 17 September 2024), licence tag 'self | cc-by-sa-4.0' (Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0), original JPEG 4569 x 6850 pixels (about 19.6 MB), category Katalin Karikó. Not used for any scoring.