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Wild weather leaves mass blackouts in Australia
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China consumption slump deepens as February prices drop
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'Things are different' Djokovic says after another early exit at Indian Wells
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Colombian guerillas release hostage security forces
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France lose Dupont but Six Nations title on the cards after thrashing Ireland
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Phone bans sweep US schools despite skepticism
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Did Ukraine have to become a partisan US issue?
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Djokovic crashes out of Indian Wells opener
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Britain's King Charles calls for unity in 'uncertain times'
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Morikawa seizes lead at Arnold Palmer after birdie rally
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Alcaraz, Keys breeze into Indian Wells third round
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Record-setting Skotheim claims European indoor heptathlon title
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Inter survive Monza scare to extend Serie A lead
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Argentina port city 'destroyed' by massive rainstorm, 13 dead
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Townsend relishing 'toughest fixture' in France after Scotland's Six Nations win over Wales
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Colombian guerillas release hostage security forces: AFP
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Some 200 detained after Istanbul Women's Day march: organisers
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Draper sends Brazilian sensation Fonseca packing at Indian Wells
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Man with Palestinian flag scales London's Big Ben clock tower
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Protesters rally on International Women's Day, fearing far right
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Australian Open champion Keys cruises into Indian Wells 3rd round
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Barca Liga match postponed after club doctor dies
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Alldritt revels in 'historic' French performance to thrash Irish
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Watkins haunts Brentford to revive Aston Villa's top-four hopes
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Pulisic double rescues AC Milan at lowly Lecce
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Mirrors, marble and mud: Desert X returns to California
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'Grieving': US federal workers thrown into uncertain job market
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Slot blast fuelled Liverpool's comeback against Southampton
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Russell back in the groove as Scotland see off Wales in Six Nations
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Remains of murdered Indigenous woman found at Canada landfill
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French throng streets for International Women's Day rallies
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Security forces taken hostage by Colombian guerillas released: AFP
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Pope responding well to pneumonia treatment, Vatican says
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France coach Galthie 'angry' at Dupont knee injury
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The French were clinical, we were not, says Irish coach Easterby
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Sleeping man is struck by train in Peru but survives
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Dembele hits double as PSG win ahead of Liverpool return
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Bosnia top envoy backs court ruling against separatist laws
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Bayern get away with shock loss as Leverkusen fall to defeat
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'We have to rebuild a city,' Argentine official says after storm kills 10
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Guardiola urges troubled Man City to fight for Champions League place
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Salah fires Liverpool 16 points clear, Forest beat Man City
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Liverpool fight back to go 16 points clear as title moves closer
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Hermes celebrates felt at Paris Fashion Week
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Bayern unpunished for shock loss as Leverkusen fall to defeat
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Majestic France destroy Irish Six Nations Grand Slam dreams
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Santner wants New Zealand to keep 'open mind' for Champions Trophy final
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Pogacar remounts after fall and charges to Strade Bianche win
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Negri wants Italy to 'make things right' against England in Six Nations
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Attack on Iran nuclear plant would leave Gulf without water, Qatar PM warns

Drew Weissman, Nobel-winning mRNA pioneer
Drew Weissman's decades of research into mRNA technology paved the way for Covid-19 vaccines, finally earning a Nobel prize for the physician-scientist.
The 64-year-old University of Pennsylvania immunologist, who won the Nobel Medicine Prize along with long-time collaborator Katalin Kariko on Monday, is far from done.
His next quests include, among others, developing a vaccine against all future coronaviruses.
"There have been three (coronavirus) pandemics or epidemics in the past 20 years," Weissman told AFP recently, referring to the original SARS virus, MERS and Covid-19.
"You have to assume there's going to be more, and our idea was that we could wait for the next coronavirus epidemic or pandemic, and then spend a year and a half making a vaccine. Or we could make one now."
- Twin breakthroughs-
The world is now aware of the elegance of the mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) vaccines, that deliver genetic instructions to cells telling them to recreate the spike protein of the coronavirus, in order to trigger effective antibodies when they encounter the real thing.
But back when Weissman teamed up with Kariko in the 1990s, the research was considered a scientific dead-end, and working with DNA was considered a more promising avenue.
"We started working together in 1998, and that was without much funding and without much in the way of publications," he said.
In 2005, the pair found a way to alter synthetic RNA to stop it from causing a massive inflammatory response found in animal experiments.
"Just before our paper was published, I said 'Our phones are going to ring off the hook,'" he recalls.
"We sat there staring at our phones for five years, and they never rang!"
With a second big breakthrough in 2015, they found a new way to deliver the particles safely and effectively to their target cells, using a fatty coating called "lipid nanoparticles."
Both developments are part of the Pfizer and Moderna Covid-19 vaccines today.
- Helping people -
Weissman grew up in Lexington, Massachusetts.
His father and mother, both since retired, were an engineer and dental hygienist, respectively.
"When I was five years old, I was diagnosed as a type-one diabetic, and back then it was testing urine and taking insulin shots a few times a day," he recalled, and this motivated him to pursue science.
He was educated at Brandeis University and completed an MD-Phd program in immunology at Boston University.
As a young fellow at the National Institutes of Health, he worked for several years in Anthony Fauci's lab on HIV research, before finally arriving at his long-time home Penn.
Weissman was a practicing doctor until a few years ago, and says it brings him great joy that his invention has helped save millions of lives.
"I'm a clinician scientist, my dream since starting college and medical school was to make something that helps people. I think I can say that I've done that. So I am incredibly happy," he said.
Beyond vaccines, mRNA technology is also being heralded for its potential across medicine.
Weissman's team is working on using RNA to develop a single-injection gene therapy to overcome the defect that causes sickle cell anemia, a genetic blood disease that 200,000 babies are born with in Africa every year.
Significant technical challenges remain to ensure the treatment is able to correctly edit genes and is safe, but the researchers are hopeful.
Bone marrow transplant, an expensive treatment with serious risks, is currently the only cure.
O.Johnson--AMWN