“Clearly this is something that legal authorities are going to have to figure out.”1The NIH gave Moderna $1.4bn to develop the vaccine and lent the company its scientists and facilities. They helped to design the key genetic sequence that prompts the vaccine to produce an immune response, and they should be named on the “principal patent application,” the NIH contends. Corbett, whose team first stabilised a viral spike protein in an mRNA vaccine, has been hailed as a role model for black women in science. The company’s filing names only Moderna scientists. “I did not expect that to be the outcome from what had been a very friendly, collaborative effort between scientists at NIH and Moderna over many years.

Source: New York Times November 12, 2021 17:31 UTC